Earlier this summer, Brad Pitt made headlines when it was revealed that he is suing Angelina Jolie over the sale of her share of Chateau Miraval. A court had previously approved Angelina’s request to sell her part of the estate, and the new owners, Tenute del Mondo were filing claims of their own against Brad for withholding information and possible financial mismanagement of the winery. That’s the part of the story that most mainstream outletshaven’t quite highlighted enough. The other part of the story that doesn’t enough play is that Angelina tried for years to sell her share to Brad so that he could own all of it but was met with obstruction after obstruction.
We are now learning more about those obstructions because a new lawsuit has been filed against Brad for $250 million (these lawsuits keep piling up, don’t they? Not unlike Johnny Depp) and while it sounds like it’s Angelina suing him, it’s actually the company she sold her share to. So let’s back it up, briefly.
Angelina’s part-ownership of Miraval was through a company she started called Nouvel. When she sold her stake in Miraval, she was basically selling this company. Nouvel, then, has new owners – Tenute del Mondo. They’re the ones who have filed this lawsuit and they allege that Brad has “squandered” money on “vanity projects” and used Miraval as retaliation against Angelina over the divorce and custody battle, icing her out of major decisions and secretly operating without consulting her even though she was an owner. Which is why she decided she wanted out.
“Although Jolie was not obligated to sell [her stake] to Pitt, she nevertheless offered to sell her interest to him and negotiated with him for months. Nearing a deal,” the suit claims, “Pitt’s hubris got the better of him: he made an eleventh-hour demand for onerous and irrelevant conditions, including a provision designed to prohibit Jolie from publicly speaking about the events that had led to the breakdown of their marriage. Pitt knew that much of Jolie’s wealth and liquidity were tied up in [her stake in the winery] and used that fact to try to force Jolie to agree to his unreasonable terms.”
The papers say that in October 2021 “after Pitt ignored Jolie’s final offer to sell her interest in the winery on the same terms Pitt had proposed but without the hush-clause” she sold it to [the new owners] instead.”
In other words, the lawsuit (which again has been filed by Nouvel and no longer owned by Angelina but by Brad’s new partners who’ve come into the business and have found Brad seriously lacking as a business partner) is alleging that the deal was conditional on her silence, that he allegedly wanted to buy her voice. Which in a way would mean he was allegedly trying to own her voice.
All this after allegedly abusing her on the private jet preceding her divorce filing. And after allegedly financially scamming her over Miraval in the aftermath…
And this is a story that’s been out there now for over 18 hours. Page Six went with it last night around 6pm. So far I haven’t seen it in PEOPLE or in any of the major mainstream entertainment publications even though when Brad sued Angelina earlier this summer, that sh-t got picked up right away.
Will this get as much play?
Or are we too focused on Brad in Venice – he arrived today ahead of theBlondepremiere (he’s a producer) and also yesterday Vanity Fairhad an exclusive first lookat Damien Chazelle’s upcomingBabylon,in which he’s the male lead. Nobody wants to f-ck up their access to Brad when that movie comes out.
