Maddox Jolie Pitt was born at the start of the millennium on August 5, 2000, in a Cambodian village.
Shortly after he was born, he was found by Angelina Jolie, who was in Cambodia on one
of her trips with the UN.
"So this country for me has been a, um, was my awakening."
Adopting him, however, turned out to be more complicated than Jolie anticipated.
According to the Daily Mail, Angelina, who was not a Cambodian citizen, received help
with the adoption from a Cambodian citizen who offered to legally adopt Maddox to try
to overcome some of the legal problems caused by the fact that Jolie was American.
The man then signed over full custody of Maddox to Angelina.
However, the legitimacy of Maddox's adoption came under further scrutiny when the documentary
The Stolen Children by Elizabeth Jacobs gained traction online.
The documentary explores the corruption of adoption agent Lauryn Galindo — the same
agent that Elizabeth's parents and Angelina both used to adopt their Cambodian babies.
The exposé led many to wonder whether Angelina's adoption of Maddox was completely legal.
"Fifteen dollars for their babies?"
Lauryn pleaded guilty of money laundering and falsifying documents to obtain US visas
for adopted children, which sent her to prison for 18 months.
According to ABC News, officials eventually said that there was nothing fraudulent in Jolie's adoption of Maddox.
Now that he is grown, Maddox Jolie-Pitt doesn't seem to desire to follow in his parents' footsteps
when it comes to acting.
However, that doesn't mean he has no interest in the film industry.
Most recently, Maddox has largely stuck to working behind the scenes.
He is best known for his work on By the Sea in 2015 as a trainee and as an executive producer
on the film First They Killed My Father in 2017.
When asked at the 2020 Oscars how he'd feel if any of his kids wanted to become actors,
Brad responded,
"I want them to follow their passions, whatever they're most interested in.
[...] But sure, why not."
Angelina Jolie seems more on board with the possibility of her kids becoming actors, having
commented to People in 2019 that she attempted unsuccessfully to get her children to act
in her movies.
She told the magazine at the time that none of her kids wanted to be actors, but that
they instead were more interested in business and humanitarian work.
Maddox Jolie-Pitt has always been ready to experience his Cambodian culture — something
surely influenced by his mother.
Maddox and his family have traveled back and forth to Cambodia ever since he was a child
to such an extent that he and his siblings even have friends there and were all living
and working there while Angelina and Maddox worked on First They Killed My Father.
Since adopting Maddox in 2002, Angelina has become a citizen of Cambodia, purchased a
home there, and established the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation, which, according to Vanity Fair,
aims to assist with "Cambodia's environmental conservation, health, education, and infrastructure."
"Seventeen years ago I came to this country and fell in love with its people."
At this point, Maddox is just as famous in his home country of Cambodia as his celebrity mom.
While Angelina now has dual citizenship in the U.S. and Cambodia, Maddox's citizenship
status isn't completely clear.
According to Angelina, who spoke with British Vogue in 2021, she sees Maddox as a Cambodian
man when he is in Cambodia, but, she said,
"At the same time, he is also an American citizen and a global citizen."
Maddox's interest in his heritage is likely what inspired him to help his mother tell
a story that is rooted in Cambodia's cultural history.
Not only was Maddox the one to inspire Angelina to finally make the film First They Killed
My Father, but, according to Angelina, Maddox also read the script, made notes, and sat
in on production meetings.
Angelina had apparently shelved the project after having worked with author Loung Ung
to adapt the autobiography into a screenplay, but as soon as Maddox said he was ready, they
got to work.
According to People, Maddox even helped with the research into the horrors brought upon
Cambodia by the Khmer Rouge communist party during the '70s, which killed roughly 2 million people.
Likely, for Maddox, the film was an important dive into his heritage and may have been a
way to connect to what his own biological relatives may have experienced.
"He was amazing.
He actually really impressed me."
Since 2016, after something reportedly happened on the Jolie-Pitt private jet between Maddox
Jolie-Pitt and his father, Brad Pitt, Maddox has been said to have a troubled relationship with Brad.
According to Us Weekly, Maddox has not only stopped using the name "Pitt" outside of legal
documents, but he's also testified against his father in court in support of his mother's custody battle.
As of July 2020, Brad and Maddox were still at odds, according to an exclusive source
who told Us Weekly that they have little to do with one another.
While Brad considers his failing relationship with Maddox a loss, indicating his regrets,
Maddox reportedly hasn't been willing to make amends, according to a separate exclusive
source for Us Weekly.
In keeping with staying connected to his culture, in 2019, Maddox Jolie-Pitt picked a college
relatively close to his Cambodian home.
Maddox went off to South Korea's Yonsei University in August 2019 to study biochemistry.
According to an exclusive source for People, Maddox was accepted elsewhere but instead
chose Yonsea, where he takes Korean lessons.
The source speculated that part of the reasoning for choosing the school could be that it's
not far from his biological family's Cambodian home, making it easier for them to visit.
According to a 2021 article in The Sun, while Maddox returned home due to the COVID-19 pandemic
in 2020, he still maintained his studies online and was set to return to South Korea for in-person
classes at Yonsei later in 2021.