Johannesburg - Angelina Jolie is the epitome of Hollywood glamour, but the Maleficent star has a dark past.
In a shocking new video, released by her former drug dealer, another Angelina, far removed from the sultry screen siren we have come to know, emerges. The footage captures a younger, gaunt, Angelina with bloodshot eyes and marks on her arms. She shuffles around a messy apartment, littered with trash bags and empty soda cans, picking at her skin with dirty fingernails as she engages in a rambling conversation with her father, the actor Jon Voight.
According to the Daily Mail, a convicted drug dealer Franklin Meyer claims her shot the 16 minutes of footage with Jolie’s consent in 1999 – a time Jolie herself has described as a “dark and dangerous” period in her life.
Meyer claims he was invited to Jolie’s Manhattan home to supply her with heroine and cocaine.
“Angie was a client of mine for several years. I sold her heroin and cocaine. One day she called me up and wanted me to drop by her place. That was her way of telling me she wanted me to bring her drugs,” he told the National Enquirer.
“At the time, I had just bought a video camera and decided to bring it along. When I arrived, I just gave her the drugs and then she gave me the money.”
Meyer said he continued to film Jolie as she spoke to her father on the phone about some family issue. He added that he would visit Jolie two to three times a week, and she would generally spend around $100 on cocaine and heroine.
Meyer further claims that Jolie was unashamed about her habit: she would regularly do the drugs in front of him, and on one occasion, he claims, she was high on coke while doing a high-profile TV interview to promote the 1999 film Girl, Interrupted. Jolie won an Oscar for her work on that film.
At the time, she was also dating fellow actor Billy Bob Thornton, and Meyer claims Jolie was very open about her sex life, boasting about Thornton’’s sexual prowess, her love of S&M, and her lesbian fantasies.
He claims Jolie confessed to a lesbian affair with actress Jenny Shimizu, who she worked with on the 1996 film Foxfire. Jolie later admitted as much, saying in a magazine interview that she fell in love with Shimizu “the first second I saw her”.
That same year, Jolie also posed for a set of provocative pictures taken by a friend.
The images, which were published by The Enquirer, shows Jolie with black tape over her nipples and a dog leash around her neck. In another image, she wears a blindfold.
In an interview with 60 Minutes in 2011, Jolie reflected on this dark period in her life, suggesting she was lucky to be alive.
“I went through heavier, darker times and I survived them. I didn't die young, so I’m very lucky. There are other artists and people who didn’t survive certain things.
“I think people can imagine that I did the most dangerous and I did the worst. For many reasons I shouldn’t be here. You think of those too many times where you came close to too many dangerous things, too many chances taken too far.' - Tonight Reporter