Brad Pitt’s latest heartbreaking blow as son Maddox, 24, DROPS his surname… after his other kids with ex Angelina Jolie did the same
Maddox Jolie-Pitt, the adopted son of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, has officially applied to remove the actor’s surname.
The Daily Mail confirmed that Maddox, 24, legally requested the removal of ‘Pitt’ from his surname on Thursday, changing his full name to Maddox Chivan Jolie and listing the reason for this as ‘personal’.
Maddox unofficially dropped her surname in February when she was listed as Maddox Jolie instead of Maddox Jolie-Pitt in the end credits of her mother’s film, Couture.
In a heartbreaking blow to the Oscar-winning actor, who has become estranged from his children, Maddox joined many of his siblings in moving away from the Pitt name following his 20-year-old sister Shiloh’s legal name change last year.
Her other sisters, Zahara (21) and Vivienne (17), also unofficially dropped the name.
Pitt, 62, and Jolie, 50, were married from 2014 to 2019, but their relationship came to a tumultuous end years before their divorce was finalized.
The Daily Mail has reached out to Pitt’s representatives for comment.
Maddox Jolie-Pitt, the adopted son of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, has officially filed to have the actor’s surname removed; Pitt spotted in 2025
The Daily Mail confirmed that Maddox applied for the name change on Thursday and that the reason was ‘personal’; Maddox seen with Jolie and Pitt in 2013
The couple called it quits after a volatile incident on a private flight in 2016 and years of harassment allegations, which Pitt denied.
Maddox, who previously worked as a production assistant on Jolie’s biopic Maria about legendary opera singer Maria Callas, was referred to as Maddox Jolie-Pitt.
In addition to Maddox, Zahara, Shiloh and Vivienne, Jolie and Pitt also share sons Pax, 22, and Vivienne’s twin, Knox, 17.
Born Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt last year, Shiloh legally changed her name to Shiloh Jolie shortly after she turned 18.
At the time, Shiloh’s attorney, Peter Levine, said in a statement shared with People that he “made an independent and important decision following painful events,” adding that he was “solely following due process” in issuing the notice of amendment.
“Shiloh Jolie did not run an ‘advertisement’ announcing any name change, and media reports to that effect were not inaccurate,” Levine explained, according to People .
‘As Shiloh’s attorney, I need to issue a legal notice because the law in California requires anyone who wants to change their name to do so. This legal notice was duly published in the Los Angeles Times.’
A month after Shiloh filed to reveal her father’s last name, a source told People that Pitt’s relationship with his older children is strained.
Maddox unofficially dropped his surname in February when he was listed as Maddox Jolie instead of Maddox Jolie-Pitt in the end credits of his mother’s film, Couture; seen in 2019
Maddox has joined several of his siblings in moving away from the Pitt name, following his 20-year-old sister Shiloh’s legal name change; Jolie photographed with Shiloh (right) and other daughter Zahara in 2021
‘He has almost no contact with adult children. An insider said his contact with young children has been more limited in recent months due to his filming schedule.
In May 2024, Vivienne was featured as Vivienne Jolie, not Vivienne Jolie-Pitt, in the playbill for the Broadway musical The Outsiders.
Meanwhile, Zahara recently abandoned Pitt’s name once again as she graduated from Spelman College.
Her name was read as Zahara Marley Jolie at the ceremony, instead of the hyphenated Jolie-Pitt.
According to TMZ, Pitt skipped the graduation ceremony.
‘Nothing stopped him from showing up for her. Or I never visited it. The day was about everything he accomplished. “It’s not whether she’s willing to participate or not,” a source close to Jolie told the publication.
But multiple sources spoke exclusively to the Daily Mail in defense of Pitt; She insisted that he was not the father portrayed and that she wanted a relationship with her six children.
With the death of Pitt’s mother, Jane Etta Pitt, at the age of 84 last year, the division in the family came to the fore once again.
At the time, sources revealed that Jane had been heartbreakingly estranged from Pitt’s children for nearly nine years and that they had not had a chance to talk before his death.
‘The most heartbreaking part was that Angelina kept the children away from their parents, away from their own grandparents,’ one person told the Daily Mail last August.
