Jennifer Aniston has said her role in comedy film The Break-Up helped her overcome her divorce from Brad Pitt.
The Friends star split from the F1 actor in 2005 amid one of the most highly-publicised break-ups in Hollywood and Aniston appeared in the comedy film, alongside Vince Vaughn, the following year.
Aniston has now revealed that the film’s producers “were a little nervous about making the offer” so soon after her split from Pitt as they thought it might be “insensitive”.
However, she jumped at the opportunity to pour her emotions into a film role, viewing it as a chance to process her feelings around the split.
“I might’ve just gone through a separation – that little separation, I’m sure nobody remembers that,” Aniston joked in a new interview with Vanity Fair.
“It was kind of cathartic to go right from that. So when they came to me, they were a little nervous about making the offer, because they thought, ‘Oh, is that insensitive? Is it inappropriate?’ But I actually thought, ‘What a great opportunity.’”
Aniston explained: “I knew it would actually kind of benefit me emotionally, just as a human being. And also serve the script and the character pretty well.”
The Break-Up follows a couple who endure a drawn-out split, going back-and-forth with petty plans to teach each other a lesson before separating for good. It prompted discussion on relationships and the efforts required to keep them going.
Aniston’s divorce from Pitt arrived shortly after her ex met Angelina Jolie on the set of 2005 action film Mr and Mrs Smith. Pitt would go on to marry Jolie in a secret ceremony in France in 2014, before their divorce in 2019.
Aniston shared the advice she gave herself to get through the intensive tabloid scrutiny at the time: “Just pick yourself up by the bootstraps and keep on walking, girl.”
She added: “It was such juicy reading for people. If they didn’t have their soap operas, they had their tabloids. It’s a shame that it had to happen, but it happened. And boy did I take it personally.”
Aniston said she “didn’t have a strong enough constitution to not get affected” by the level of attention.
“We’re human beings, even though some people don’t want to believe we are. They think, ‘You signed up for it, so you take it.’ But we really didn’t sign up for that,” she said.
Aniston will next be seen in season four of Apple TV+ series The Morning Show, which starts on 17 September.
