Angelina Jolie is credited as a producer on the Broadway production of 'The Outsiders' while Vivienne is a producer's assistant.
Angelina Jolie says that producing the Broadway adaptation of The Outsiders helped her to understand her daughter, Vivienne, more deeply.
Sitting down with Deadline ahead of the 77th Annual Tony Awards on Sunday, the Girl, Interrupted actress, 49, opened up about her youngest child's love of theater and how it led to their involvement as producer and producer's assistant with the show. The Outsiders is nominated for 12 Tony Awards, including Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical and Best Direction of a Musical, a nod that went to Danya Taymor, who sat down with Angelina for the interview.
Angelina previously shared with ET that it was a shared love of the production at the La Jolla Playhouse that began the process of them helping to bring the show to New York. In the new interview, though, she elaborated on but shared with Deadline just how much her child wanted to participate in sharing The Outsiders with the world.
"My daughter Viv loves theater. She appreciates all theater but she certainly knows what she feels close to and what she responds to. She went to see The Outsiders at La Jolla about five times and was telling me about it, and I had read the book, and I’d seen the film years ago," Angelina shared with the outlet, adding that when Vivienne, 15, came to her and asked her to see it, she saw it as an opportunity to get to know her own child better.
"...Danya speaks of how important it is to teenagers, how it was written by somebody who’s the age of my daughter, right? So, really, as a mother, as a person, I was watching it, but I was really watching the effect it was having on my young daughter and what she was telling me about herself, and I was learning what about it was important to her and why it connected so deeply to her," the actress continued.
The Outsiders is a staged musical adaptation of the film and the 1967 novel by S. E. Hinton. The 1983 film of the same name helped to launch the careers of actors like Ralph Macchio, Rob Lowe, Matt Dillon, Patrick Swayze, Tom Cruise, Emilio Estevez and more.
"Ponyboy Curtis, his best friend Johnny Cade and their Greaser family of outsiders battle with their affluent rivals, the Socs. This thrilling new Broadway musical navigates the complexities of self-discovery as the Greasers dream about who they want to become in a world that may never accept them," reads the play's description on the show's official site.
For Angelina, who says that her daughter -- whom she shares with ex-husband Brad Pitt -- is in the thick of the complicated teenage years, truly understanding the source material became one way to put herself in her daughter's shoes. Angelina and Brad -- who were together for 12 years -- share six children in total: Maddox, 22, Pax, 20, Zahara, 19, Shiloh, 17, Vivienne, and her twin brother, Knox, 15.
"So, it was a very different experience of understanding, of how this is having a significant effect on her as a young person right now, and she's communicating something to me, and that is the power of this material, which was in really good shape even by then. And then I had the privilege of watching everyone work over this last year to make it into what it is, and Vivienne has been there the whole way," she said.
The "whole way" includes everything from production meetings to the opening night at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre in the Big Apple. In March, Angelina and Vivienne had a rare public outing as they attended the celebration and posed for pics with the cast and crew.
Furthermore, the duo is credited for their work in the show's official playbill, which made headlines in May as Vivienne opted to drop her dad's last name, echoing moves made by sisters Shiloh and Zahara, who have both chosen to go without "Pitt" in their names.
The project is not the first (or last) time that the pair has shown off their love of the arts, though. In 2022, the mother-daughter duo attended a performance of Dear Evan Hansen in Philadelphia and met with the cast backstage.
Angelina and Vivienne also recently posed for photos alongside Kristen Bell at the opening of Reefer Madness: The Musical in Los Angeles. The Veronica Mars actress, 43, starred in the film that the stage production is adapted from.
If we had to put money on it, The Outsiders also won't be the last show they work on together or the last time they see their work acknowledged by the theater community. In 2023, Angelina told ET via a statement that Vivienne's passion for the arts is something she anticipates sticking around for a while.
"Viv reminds me of my mother [Marcheline Bertrand] in that she isn’t focused on being the center of attention but in being a support to other creatives," Angelina said. "She’s very thoughtful and serious about theatre and working hard to best understand how to contribute."
For more on the mother-daughter duo taking over the theater world, check out the links below.
Hosted once again by Ariana DeBose, the 77th Tony Awards will air live on Sunday, June 16, at 5 p.m. PT/8p.m. ET on CBS and Paramount+.
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