LOS ANGELES – The already contentious split of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie got a little more contentious Thursday, with Pitt suing his ex- wife, claiming she sold off her share of a French winery the couple owned to a Russian oligarch.
The Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit contends that Jolie sold her stake in Chateau Miraval without Pitt’s consent, despite a previous agreement that “they would never sell their respective interests in Miraval without the other’s consent.”
Representatives for Jolie could not be reached after business hours for comment.
According to the lawsuit, the then-couple purchased a controlling interest in the southern France winery in 2008, envisioning the chateau “as a home to share with their children and the vineyard as a family business.” The couple were married at the estate in 2014.
“The vineyard became Pitt’s passion — and a profitable one, as Miraval, under Pitt’s stewardship, has grown into a multimillion dollar international success story and one of the world’s most highly regarded producers of rosé wine,” the lawsuit states.
But with the couple now split, Jolie in October sold her interest in the winery to a Luxembourg-based spirits manufacturer controlled by Russian oligarch Yuri Shefler, the lawsuit contends.
“Jolie consummated the purported sale without Pitt’s knowledge, denying Pitt the consent right she owed him and the right of first refusal her business entity owed his,” according to the suit. “She sold her interest with the knowledge and intention that Shefler and his affiliates would seek to control the business to which Pitt had devoted himself and to undermine Pitt’s investment in Miraval.”
The suit also claims that Jolie stopped contributing to the business “long ago,” but is now seeking “profits she has not earned and returns on an investment she did not make.”
The suit seeks to reverse Jolie’s sale of her stake in the winery, along with unspecified damages.
