Angelina Jolie counters Gwyneth Paltrow: UN Ambassador says actresses shouldn't 'complain' about being working mothers

The Maleficent actress says famous working mothers should look at the bigger picture before complaining

Angelina Jolie: 'What doesn't kill you makes you stronger'

Angelina Jolie has countered the views of Gwyneth Paltrow by saying that Hollywood actresses shouldn’t complain about being working mothers.

Jolie pointed out that the plight of famous actresses with children was not as a terrible as the circumstances of “most women in this world”.

“I’m not a single mom with two jobs trying to get by every day,” Jolie told the New York Daily News.

“I have much more support than most people, most women in this world. And I have the financial means to have a home and health care and food."

Her standing contrasts starkly with the controversial comments made by Paltrow in March, in which she moaned that motherhood is “much harder for me”.

With an impressive lack of perspective, she described the difficulties in parenting when you’re not in the obviously fortunate position of working “an office job”, when looking after your children is apparently much easier than being a successful actress.

”It's much harder for me. I feel like I set it up in a way that makes it difficult because…for me, like if I miss a school run, they are like, 'Where were you?'" Paltrow said.

”I think it's different when you have an office job, because it's routine and, you know, you can do all the stuff in the morning and then you come home in the evening.

“When you're shooting a movie, they're like, 'We need you to go to Wisconsin for two weeks,' and then you work 14 hours a day and that part of it is very difficult. I think to have a regular job and be a mom is not as, of course there are challenges, but it's not like being on set.”

But Jolie disagrees and says that her acting peers should appreciate their circumstances, look at the bigger picture and not complain. She has six children with long-term partner Brad Pitt, three of which are adopted.

“I actually feel that women in my position, when we have all at our disposal to help us, shouldn’t complain," she said.

”Consider all the people who really struggle and don’t have the financial means, don’t have the support, and many people are single raising children. That’s hard.”

Paltrow’s views caused one non-famous working mother to write a letter to the actress, published in the New York Post, in which she did her best to sympathise with the “gruelling circumstances of being on a movie set”.

“Thank God I don’t make millions filming one movie per year’ is what I say to myself pretty much every morning as I wait on a windy Metro-North platform, about to begin my 45-minute commute into the city,” an extract from the letter reads.

“Whenever things get rough, all I have to do is keep reminding myself of that fact. It is my mantra.

“And I know all my fellow working-mom friends feel the same. Am I right, ladies?"