Jolie Tipped Off Photog for First Brangelina Scoop

'Rolling Stone' co-founder Jann Wenner dishes celebrity tales in memoir out Tuesday
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 8, 2022 9:20 AM CDT
Jolie Tipped Off Photog for First Brangelina Scoop
In this May 12, 2014 file photo, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie attend the premiere of HBO Films' "The Normal Heart" at the Ziegfeld Theatre in New York.   (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)

Rolling Stone co-founder Jann Wenner has a lot of celebrity anecdotes—some of which he's exposing in an upcoming memoir. Perhaps the juiciest tidbit to come out of Like a Rolling Stone involves the 2000s love triangle that was Jennifer Aniston, Brad Pitt, and Angelina Jolie. Wenner, who formerly owned Us Weekly, writes that it was Jolie who tipped off a photographer that she and Pitt were vacationing together in Kenya in 2005, just three months after Pitt and Aniston announced their split. Jolie told the photographer where the couple were staying and when and where they could be spotted on a beach stroll, Wenner writes, per Page Six. As a result, "we had the worldwide scoop, the debut of Brangelina." Other celebrities mentioned:

  • Tom Cruise: Wenner describes the actor as an enigma. He notes Cruise once accompanied a reporter on a guided tour of a Scientology Center, but "in the end he said nothing; he thoroughly deflects," Wenner writes, per Page Six. "You walk away thinking you know the guy, but all you know is that here is a confident and extremely polite man. He wouldn't even reveal whether he was for or against [President] Bush."
  • Prince: He describes the night Prince gave "the greatest performance in the history of the Hall of Fame" at Wenner's own induction ceremony in 2004, per CBS News. It was an "all-star ensemble performance of 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'" and "his playing was transcendent. I remember standing there, my mouth open, tearing up, in dumbstruck awe."

  • Bette Midler: He describes showing his overlarge scrotum, which had filled with fluid and become "the size of a head of cauliflower," to his good friend and her husband Martin von Haselberg. "I dramatically undraped it," Wenner writes, per Page Six. "And after some minutes of gasping and mock shock, lewd jokes and peals of laughter, Martin took photos for the scrapbooks. I wanted Bette to be my nurse."
Wenner "takes us into the life and work of Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Mick Jagger, Bono, and Bruce Springsteen, to name a few," according to publisher Little Brown. The book is out on Tuesday. (More Jann Wenner stories.)

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