Tigress Jolie Announces She’s Having Twins at Cannes

DreamWorks Animation ‘Kung Fu Panda’ Opening Cannes Film Festival
By Robin Rowe for Hollywood Today

CANNES, FR (RUSHPRNEWS) 5/15/08 – Asked at the Cannes Film Festival if it’s true she’s having twins, Angela Jolie said, “Well, Jack’s just confirmed it actually.” Her ‘Kung Fu Panda’ co-star Jack Black had made reference to them. She’s expecting twins with actor Brad Pitt. It’s the Hollywood couple’s fifth and sixth children.

Jolie says she had many reasons for accepting the role of Tigress in ‘Kung Fu Panda’. “I have two children from Asia,” says Jolie. “The fact that I get to be in ‘Kung Fu Panda,’ which is set in China, and I get to play a tiger, that’s very cool.” Jolie has previously voiced for DreamWorks Animation as Lola in ‘Shark Tale’.

“Tigress is very straightforward,” says Jolie describing her character. “They explained to me that there are all different styles of kung fu, and her’s is attack. There’s no defense. It’s just attack, attack, attack…so that makes her a very interesting character.”

“Directing Angelina Jolie is pretty surreal,” says ‘Kung Fu Panda’ co-director Mark Osborne. “She’s amazing. You have to kind of look away, you know? You can’t look at her directly while she’s performing, or your brain goes to mush. But what’s even more amazing about her is what she brings to the character. Her huge spirit and talents as a performer give Tigress all of these layers, and the character really expanded and grew deeper under her touch.”

“When I first came in and saw all the characters, and I didn’t know who I was, I was secretly hoping I got to be Tigress,” says Jolie. “I love her.”

“Really, I’m a big kid,” says Jolie. “Animation has grown and changed in the last few years. The stories are so good. There are some beautiful messages and some really fun characters. The setting is absolutely beautiful. I love that part of the world. This film was especially interesting to me because it was a sort of return to the classics. It’s like classic storytelling for children.”

“It was important to all of us, from the start that ‘Kung Fu Panda’ would have a theme, a positive message that we really believed in,” says Osborne. “We wanted it to be a fun experience loaded with comedy and great action.”

“The bridge fight with all the different styles of fighting from the different animals, and how they put it together in a really clever way…it was so much more than I anticipated,” says Jolie. “Well thought-out, beautifully done, and really funny.”

“I think the bridge fight is one of the coolest kung fu fights ever put on film,” says Osborne. “The sequence is complicated for many reasons. Our characters have fur. Our characters wear clothing, plus they’re doing kung fu and fighting on a disintegrating rope bridge…all of it is extremely complicated.”

DreamWorks Animation’s ‘Kung Fu Panda’ is set for its worldwide premiere tomorrow night at 7:30pm at the the Palais of the Cannes Film Festiveal. The red carpet will include ‘Kung Fu Panda’ stars Angelina Jolie, Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman, and Lucy Liu and DreamWorks Animation’s Jeffrey Katzenberg.

‘Kung Fu Panda’ releases in the United States on June 6th.