Angelina Jolie says she’d rather her kids be “out there trying and failing” — or in the case of her 23-year-old son Maddox, piloting a plane — than not taking “risks” at all.
Speaking with W Magazine for one of 16 unique covers as part of its “Volume 1, Best Performances” issue, the 49-year-old Academy Award winner detailed her thoughts on her eldest son’s passion for flying.
When asked if she was “nervous” about Maddox manning an aircraft, she replied: “No.”
“Maybe I just have a big family,” Jolie joked. “I worry more that people aren’t finding themselves and something they love. I think that’s more dangerous, to walk so tentatively through life that you don’t take a risk. You don’t wake up with passion. I think that’s scarier.”
“I’d rather they be out there trying and failing than not pushing and being passionate,” she added.
Jolie —who shares Maddox, Pax, 21, Zahara, 19, Shiloh, 18, Knox, 16, and Vivienne, 16 with ex Brad Pitt — previously spoke about Maddox’s time in the sky while appearing on a Dec. 5 episode of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, when she confirmed that her son followed in her footsteps to become a trained pilot.
As for Jolie’s connection to flying, she was inspired to get in the cockpit by her son back in 2004, eventually becoming a pilot herself.
“Every time Mad sees a plane, he’s amazed,” Jolie told PEOPLE at the time. “If I could actually fly a plane by the time he’s 4, I’ll be like Superman to him.”
After getting her license in December 2004, the actress purchased a single-engine plane, a Cirrus SR22-G2, in early 2025 featuring the letters “MX” in her tail number in honor of her son. She then shared with PEOPLE in 2017 that Maddox had begun to fly, as well.
“He’s quite capable and always takes me by surprise,” Jolie said at the time. “He’s been practicing flying, then they called me the other day and said, ‘so Mad can go solo,’ and I nearly dropped the phone!”
Elsewhere during her latest appearance on Fallon, Jolie spoke about her kids’ attitudes toward one day working in entertainment, sharing that some of them — specifically daughter Shiloh — “want to be private.”
“Just private, not photographed, not on the thing. I think, her most of all would like privacy,” Jolie said.
“But it wasn’t their choice,” the Maleficent star added of her children’s fame. “So some people are more comfortable with public, some people are more comfortable with talk shows.”
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While talking with the BBC in December 2024 about her new film, Maria, Jolie spoke about Pax and Maddox working on the project as production assistants and said they got to see their mom expressing pain in “a new way.”
“They’ve seen me go through a lot of things, but they hadn’t experienced me expressing a lot of the pain that usually a parent hides from a child,” Jolie said, adding that they were there for her during emotional moments.
“They were there to witness some of that,” she said, “but then we would hug or they would bring me cups of tea.”
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