Brangelina: How It Began

Seeing Angelina Jolie on the cover of People's year-end review issue got me thinking about the whole Brangelina thing, which started 10 years ago. A quick review: Brad and Angie filmed Mr. and Mrs. Smith in 2004, and although there were rumors during filming about how well the two co-stars were getting alone, in public things were officially fine between Brad and Jen. People reassured the world with a sidebar headline on the cover of the January 17, 2005 issue, announcing "Brad and Jen's Romantic Getaway" and this item inside: 

From the January 17, 2005 issue: 
If you believed the rumors, the four-year marriage of Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt was, if not on the rocks, veering dangerously close to the guardrail. There was Jen at the L.A. airport late last month—without her hubby or her diamond-studded wedding band. Earlier there she was shopping—alone again—in London, where she'd been shooting her new thriller Derailed while Brad was off promoting Ocean's Twelve. Even after her rep Stephen Huvane insisted, "Everything is fine with Jennifer and Brad," the naysayers persisted. 

The latest sighting of the couple (yes, together at last!)—in warm embrace on the Caribbean isle of Anguilla over New Year's weekend—might just change their minds. A source close to the action says Aniston, 35, and Pitt, 41, "were quite lovey-dovey, basically all over each other, hugging and kissing." The couple had been hanging out since Dec. 31 with Jen's former Friends costar Courteney Cox Arquette and husband David Arquette at a private villa. "On New Year's Day," says the source, "Brad and Jen went on a little speedboat ride with Courteney," whose daughter, 7- month-old Coco, stayed behind with a nanny. Later that day Brad was seen tooling around on a moped. Alas, by Jan. 4, the romantic reunion was over: Pitt was off to Miami to attend the Orange Bowl, while Aniston was due back in L.A. to start a new movie. 

The following week, things fell apart and the Brangelina/Jen triangle dominated pop culture for the rest of the year. Here's how it played out through the birth of daughter Shiloh on May 27, 2006, as seen through the filter of People magazine cover stories:  

January 24, 2005


January 31, 2005


April 11, 2005


May 9, 2005


June 20, 2005


July 11, 2005


July 18, 2005


August 15, 2005


September 5, 2005


October 31, 2005


December 19, 2005


December 26, 2005


January 23, 2006


January 30, 2006


February 6, 2006


June 12, 2006


June 19, 2006


Did anything else happen in 2005? Actually, yes. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes got married and had a baby; Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore got married, Charles and Camilla got married, and the first stories about Kate Middleton as a possible royal girlfriend started to appear. Johnny Carson, Peter Jennings and Pope John Paul II died and in late August, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans.