Angelina Jolie struggled to slip back into Maleficent after 'a few years of difficulty'

Erin Jensen, USA TODAY

Angelina Jolie is speaking candidly about how she grappled with re-discovering Maleficent for the follow-up to the 2014 film.

"It was a tough time,” the Oscar-winning actress admitted to People magazine of slipping back into the role for "Maleficent: Mistress of Evil," in theaters Friday.

“I’d been coming off a few years of difficulty, and I was not feeling very strong," she added. "In fact, I was feeling pretty broken. It took me a moment to feel the strength of (Maleficent) again.”

Jolie, 44, did not expand to the entertainment news outlet on the difficulty she experienced. It is worth noting that she filed for divorce from her long-time love Brad Pitt in 2016 after two years of marriage. "This decision was made for the health of the family," Robert Offer, an attorney for Jolie, told USA TODAY in a statement at the time.

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The former pair have six children – Maddox, 18; Pax, 15; Zahara, 14; Shiloh, 13; and twins Vivienne and Knox, 11 – who were at the center of a custody dispute. Jolie wanted sole physical custody, while Pitt desired to to share physical custody.

In court documents from August 2018, Jolie's attorneys alleged Pitt hadn't paid any "meaningful" child support for a year and a half and she planned to seek a court order for retroactive funds. Pitt hit back, asserting in court documents that he loaned Jolie $8 million for her current Los Angeles residence and has paid over $1.3 million in bills for her and the children.

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Angelina Jolie with four of her six kids: Vivienne, Zahara, Shiloh and Knox Jolie-Pitt at the
Angelina Jolie with four of her six kids: Vivienne, Zahara, Shiloh and Knox Jolie-Pitt at the

Jolie was thoughtful in reprising her role. Director Joachim Ronning said "hours and hours" were spent discussing the character's lipstick choice.

"I felt in the first film, (the lips) were a bit saturated," he told USA TODAY. "I wanted to make them feel a little more natural, a little cooler and darker – but keeping them the red, red, red."

Ronning says he and Jolie went back and forth before agreeing upon the film's no-shine MAC Matte Russian Red lipstick.

"It's so important to her. So it was pretty much Angelina and I, battling it out. But at the end of the day, we agreed. We changed the color a bit," says Ronning, who notes that the decision ultimately rested with Jolie, one of the film's producers. "When she gets happy, then I get happy. That’s the order of things."

Contributing: Andrea Mandell, Maria Puente and Bryan Alexander

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Angelina Jolie struggled to reprise Maleficent after feeling 'broken'