Brad Pitt Reveals He Once Wanted "a Dozen" Children With Angelina Jolie, Opens Up About Their "History" Together

"I never knew how much I could love something until I looked in the faces of my children," the actor says

By Zach Johnson Nov 30, 2015 7:25 PMTags
E! Placeholder Image

The bigger, the better!

Brad Pitt, 51, and Angelina Jolie, 40, are the proud parents of six children—Maddox Jolie-Pitt, 14, Pax Jolie-Pitt, 11, Zahara Jolie-Pitt, 10, Shiloh Jolie-Pitt, 9, Knox Jolie-Pitt, 7, and Vivienne Jolie-Pitt, 7—but if Pitt had his way, he would have doubled the number of kids in their family. "Listen, Angie and I were aiming for a dozen, but we crapped out after six," Pitt, 51, tells The Telegraph.

"Everyone talks about the joy of having kids—blah, blah, blah. But I never knew how much I could love something until I looked in the faces of my children," says Pitt, who admits that his house can be "chaos, total chaos" at times. Still, he admits that it's "so much fun." When there's too much chaos, he shuts it down right away. And though he's the disciplinarian with his sons, Pitt says he takes it easy on his daughters. "Girls do no wrong...I feel like my job is to show 'em around, help them find what they want to do with their life, put as many things in front of them, and pull them back when they get out of line, so they know who they are."

Watch: Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt Team Up in "By the Sea"

Pitt insists that his children's lives are quite "normal" in spite of their parents' fame and fortune. "Because we're migratory workers in a sense, they have this wonderful thing where they get to be students of the world. They have memories of being in Vietnam, or that time in Paris, or over in Calgary," he says. "The downside is friends, sleepovers, team sports—these have been the challenges that we've had to work out. We do those things, but we really have to go out of our way. And Mom is a matador about it all—she's fantastic. We get their friends to us a lot."

In recent years, the actor/producer has spent more time away from the camera in order to be with his children. As Pitt tells The Telegraph, "Family—and certainly kids and a stable relationship—is something bigger than yourself. They need you to sit down with them, be there for them when they wake up in the middle of the night. They need you. So, I think that made me less tense about things, less stressed. And very clear that if I'm going to be doing something that's going to take me away from my family, it better be something that I believe in, and that they're going to see and be proud of their dad. And also I'm more efficient with it, because it's taking me away from them. I don't f—k about. I get in there, I get the job done, and I go home. You know, nowadays I really can't wait to get home. More than at any time in my life, I've got purpose—real purpose. It feels like I've found my place."

Watch: Brad Pitt Talks Being Directed By Wife Angelina

At a time when so many A-list couples are calling it quits, Pitt remains committed to his director wife. That said, the twice-married actor knows the odds are against them. "Certainly the attrition rate of Hollywood couples looms large. And I'm surprised how much our history—Angie's and mine—means to me. That we have this story together. That we know each other. That we watch each other getting older, through amazing moments, joys, pains. That we know each other. It means so much to me. I don't know. I'm just surprised, because you hear people talking about the old ball and chain, and people trying to recapture youth, as if that's the impulse—but it's not the impulse. It's not the impulse at all," the Big Short actor says, adding, "There are no books to tell you what year 12 is supposed to be like, and year 14 and year 23—no guidebooks. What I'm saying is, I'm surprised how much it means to me, how much value I place in it. I'd equate it to having kids."

(E! and Universal Pictures are both members of the NBCUniversal family.)