Angelina Jolie Voight was born June 4, 1975, in Los Angeles, California. She is the daughter of actors John Voight and actress Marcheline Bertrand. Jolie’s parents divorced in 1976 and she and her brother James Haven lived with their mother, who gave up her acting ambitions to raise her children. Her father’s successful acting career inspired young Angelina to become an actor.
When she was five-years-old, she had a bit part in her father’s film Lookin’ to Get Out (1982). When she was six, her mother and her live-in boyfriend moved to Palisades, New York. They moved back to Los Angeles five years later. It was at this time that she decided she wanted to act and enrolled at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute. She trained there for two years.
Jolie spent some time at Beverly Hills High School where she felt isolated from her affluent classmates because her family survived on her mother’s modest income. She was bullied by other teens for being very thin with glasses and braces. Her mom tried to get her to model, but early attempts at that were unsuccessful. She transferred to Moreno High School. It was at this point that she began wearing all black clothing. She lived with her boyfriend and experimented with knife play.