Angelina Jolie talks her biggest role in Life of being a Mother and about her movie Salt

You said in an article that you are planning to give up acting to spend more time with the kids.
I plan to cut back on acting at some point in my life as I want to do other things.
I love acting but I will make fewer films in future. You took the role right after giving birth to Vivienne and Knox.

Was it tough to pull yourself away from a mother’s role and into an action one?
Those who have just had children will understand that it’s nice to have an excuse to get out of bed and back in action, what with pregnancy and all. I was doing an action scene on a freeway where my character was being chased and I found myself thinking: “I don’t belong here. I’m somebody’s mom. They got the wrong person”.
Just two weeks earlier I was at home feeding the babies.

Did they get to join you on the set?
I was lucky to work five days a week. I spent time with them during breakfast and dinner. They also joined me for lunch. When I work, they spend more time with their father. Brad is such a great dad. However, I am home with them most of the time.
I only work between eight and 14 weeks a year.

Are they excited about what mommy is doing?
They see me do a cartwheel and think that’s extraordinary! I can’t be more cool — to them I am just mommy. When they’re on set and see me doing stunts, they understand how complicated the film-making process is.

Did you allow stunt co-coordinator Simon Crane (whom Jolie has worked with in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Mr & Mrs Smith) to push you around?
I call him Dr Crane. He was always saying “suffer...be ready to suffer”.
He knows I love heights so there were lots of action sequences involving heights.
He also kept pushing me where the fights scenes were concerned.

Where does your fearlessness come from? Were you always the kid who jumped off anything?
I was and now I have those fearless kids — Pax and Shiloh.

How do you find action adventure in real life?
I fly planes, ride bikes with Brad and travel to uncharted territories. But the greatest adventure of all is having children. Our kids are very much a part of everything we do.

Did you always have strong role models in your life?
I had a very strong mother. (Jolie’s mother was the late actress Marcheline Bertrand who died in 2007). She always called herself Marshmallow. She was the softest person in the world and could never yell at me without laughing. She was the kindest and most loving person I had ever known in my life and her faith and integrity were so strong they were unbreakable. I now live with three very strong women — my daughters Zahara, Shiloh and Vivienne.

What was it like losing your mother?
It will never heal. Somebody said to me recently ‘you will never get over it and you will never want to.’

The role of Salt was originally written for a male actor. Does this mean gender roles don’t apply in Hollywood anymore?
It will always matter. I’ve played lots of strong female characters but they were often set in some kind of fantasy world so my experience may differ from other actresses.

Which historical figure would you want to play?
I think it’s already been made known — Cleopatra. She was misunderstood and her life story was written wrongly. I always thought her life was very glamorous.
Then I read her story and learnt a different side to her — that she was a mother, leader and an intellect who spoke five languages! Her upbringing also reflected her relationship with Rome — all that is much more interesting than what she was summed up to be.

Would you play it differently than the version portrayed by Elizabeth Taylor?
Yes, but I could never be as lovely as she was. We are trying to uncover the truth about her as a leader and not just a sex symbol which she really wasn’t — she didn’t have many lovers, may be only two and they’re men she had children with.

How much creative control did you have over your character (rumour has it that Tom Cruise was originally approached to play the part)?
We all worked together — the writers and actors. Everybody had an opinion. I had my own views about the character but I didn’t decide on anything that other people didn’t agree. The last time you worked with Noyce was 11 years ago.

Do you think the girl in The Bone Collector knew what she was doing compared to the one in Salt?
I don’t know. I have to watch that movie again and I will tell you (laughs). I only play characters I can identify with. Maybe you can compare the two characters and see a similarity. In The Bone Collector, I play a rookie cop who’s way out of her depth in solving murder cases. In Salt, I play a tough agent who knows who she is and what she is doing.

How difficult is it to internalise deep characters and then switch back to being a mommy?
I am not one of those actors who has to walk around in character all the time. If the subject matter is dark, I tend to giggle a lot — it’s like an emotional release.

You mentioned that shooting the interrogation scene with Polish actor Daniel Olbrychski (as the defected Russian spy Vassily Orlov) was tough because he stayed in character even when the camera stopped rolling.
After a heavy scene like that, most of us just got up and walked away. I like to switch off and be myself again. But for that particular scene, I had to stay in character even during breaks. We talked about the scene and our characters and Daniel was just beautifully “heavy” and “deep”. To some extent I think the experience helped develop my character. It’s nice to stay in character sometimes, but I can’t do it every time.

In an interview, you mentioned that Shiloh is trying to find her identity, just like you did when you were growing up.How would you prevent your daughter from experiencing the dark period you went through?
Most people find their teenage years and early adulthood difficult because they don’t know where they fit in and how useful they can be to the world. They are plagued with questions and they feel that the world doesn’t given them much answers.
I adapted when I got older and started to travel. I visited places where people were suffering and learnt so much from the experiences. Most importantly, I felt ashamed of being sad because I was actually very fortunate. The more I travel, the more excited I am about life and its possibilities. I hope to raise my children in such a way so that they are exposed to many of life’s experiences.

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Angelina Jolie: Brad Pitt accepts 'all my flaws and all my oddities'

Now that Angelina Jolie has shed her wild-child image, the actress is loving her new life as a homebody.

"We're very homebound," Jolie says of her relationship with partner Brad Pitt in the July 11 issue of Parade magazine. "We're very much Mommy and Daddy in our pajamas."

"There's never a period when Brad and I are pulled apart," she continues. "We are not separated for more than three days, ever. We stay really connected."

But the 35-year-old actress admits that she and Pitt have to work at finding "that special time" together.

"He takes the kids to school; he visits me on set with the kids. I'm home for dinner, or I'm there for breakfast ... We plan," she says. "Brad and I take time off between films to travel, have big experiences, do things together. That's how we work it out."

Although Jolie says she is "terrible" at trying to define love, she knows she has found it with Pitt and her children.

"It means wanting the best for the people you love, putting their interests above your own, always," she says. "Love does that. Love is what you live for."

"Brad knows me completely, exactly as I am, every part of me. He loves me. The kids love me," she adds. "They know all my flaws and all my oddities. And they accept them. And so I can feel complete."

Something Jolie feels complete without: her kids growing up in the spotlight.

"We do everything we can to keep our kids away from it," she says. "We travel to places where the kids aren't aware of that kind of thing. We try to give them a full life where they don't have to come face to face with that world. With the paparazzi present, we're careful when we leave the house. Other than that ... We don't stand in the checkout line at the grocery store looking at the magazines. Our friends don't tell us about it. And our kids don't know."

Rather than a life of glitz and glamor, Jolie just hopes to give her kids a happy life. "If Brad and I are strong and happy, then our kids have happy parents, and that's the best thing we can give them."

Life may be looking good for Jolie now, but things haven't always been so rosy for the "Salt" star.

"I used to cut myself or jump out of airplanes, trying to find something new to push up against because sometimes everything else felt too easy. I was searching for something deeper, something more," she explains. "I tried everything. I always felt caged, closed in, like I was punching at things that weren't there. I always had too much energy for the room I was in."

"I went through a period when I felt my film characters were having more fun than I was," she continues. "It might partly explain why I ended up tattooed or doing certain extreme things in my life."

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Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's Twins 2nd Birthday, Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline

Happy second birthday, Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline Jolie-Pitt!

When Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's twins arrived on July 12, 2008, there were rumors swirling that both babies were girls and their chosen names were Isla Marcheline and Amelie Jane -- which, of course proved to be untrue on all counts.

Always adventurous baby namers, this time around the star couple looked back to their family roots for inspiration. Knox was the middle name of Brad's grandfather, Hal Knox Hillhouse. By using a boy's name ending in 'x,' they followed the pattern set with older sons Maddox and Pax, making it a cohesive threesome. And, as with several other of the Brangelina choices, Knox, a surname rarely heard before, was taken up by other parents, entering the Top 1,000 list last year at #706.

Leon, Knox's middle name, also has family connections, being the name of Angelina's great-great grandfather, and, with its French accent and pronunciation, also reflects the culture of the country in which the twins were born.


Vivienne, the French form of Vivian, also reflects their place of birth. Used previously by Rosie O'Donnell, it has the uplifting meaning of "life, alive." It too entered the Most Popular list for the first time last year at #532.

Her middle name, Marcheline, was the name of Angelina's beloved mother, who had died just a year before Vivienne's birth, and whose heritage was French-Canadian and Native American. An actress, her birth name was Marcia Lynne, which she transformed into her own individual version of the French Marcelline.


Other parents have used Brad and Angelina as baby naming role models before, particularly in the cases of Maddox and Shiloh. Maddox began climbing in popularity the year following his adoption and is now is at #180, meaning that more than 2,000 parents followed their lead; Shiloh also entered the list soon after the birth of the Jolie-Pitt baby girl.
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"Mr and Mrs Smith" sequel for Angelina Jolie

Angelina Jolie has expressed interest in a sequel to Mr and Mrs Smith, the film that brought her and Brad Pitt together.

"I'd love to. We've talked about it," Jolie said in an interview with Vanity Fair.

"We'd have to figure out who's going to watch the kids, but it's really about finding the right thing, because we've looked."

But Jolie is cautious about bringing too much of her own life to any potential storyline.

"Do we have kids in the movie? We've thought about that, but it becomes personal now that we actually have kids. And if we work on it, we pull from our own life, which is funny to us, but you feel strange sharing too much."

2005's Mr and Mrs Smith told the story of a husband and wife who each discover the other is an assassin. Pitt was married to Jennifer Aniston during production, but fell for Jolie. The couple now has six children — three adopted and three biological.

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Angelina Jolie opens up about Brad Pitt, kids and retirement to Vanity Fair Angelina Jolie tells Vanity Fair she loves Brad Pitt's beard, was most like Shiloh as a child and talks about her 6 kids.

Angelina Jolie appears on the cover of Vanity Fair's August issue in which she talks about having more kids and starring with Brad Pitt in a new movie.

Angelina Jolie appears on the cover of Vanity Fair's August issue in which she talks about having more kids and starring with Brad Pitt in a new movie.

Angelina Jolie may be the most beautiful woman in the world, but her daughter has no plans to compete with mom.

"She wants to be a boy," Jolie revealed in the August issue of Vanity Fair. "She likes to wear boys' everything. She thinks she's one of the brothers."

According to the 35-year-old star, her daughter likes to dress in track pants and regular suits. So it's surprising to hear that the "Salt" star was most like Shiloh as a child.

"I used to get dressed up in costumes and jump around," the red carpet glamour puss told the magazine. "But at some point, I got closed off, darker."

Jolie doesn't remember what caused the change in her personality, but thinks it just had to do with exposure to the world around her.

"[You] start to realize the world isn’t as you wished it would be, so you deepen," she told Vanity Fair. "Then, as I had kids and got older - being goofy, lighter - it all came back."

These days, Jolie doesn't mind that the tabloids make fun of her partner Brad Pitt's scraggly beard ("I love Brad in every state)" or that they always seem to cycle between reporting about the star couple separating, marrying and being pregnant.

"We're not against getting married. It's just like we already are," she said. "Children are clearly a commitment, a bigger commitment (than marriage). It's for life."

As for expanding their six-strong brood, Jolie said she's isn't pregnant at the moment.

"We're not opposed to it. But we want to make sure we can give everybody special time," she told Vanity Fair. "We want to make sure we don't build a family so big that we don't have absolutely enough time to raise them each really well."

That time may free up soon. Jolie reiterated to Vanity Fair that she doesn't plan to continue acting for much longer.

"It's not the most important thing in my life," she said. "Because I have a happy home….I got back from work last night, and everybody was playing music and dancing and I suddenly found myself dancing around with a bunch of little fun crazy people.”

But the actress said she is not averse to working with her husband before she retires for good.

"We'd have to figure out who’s going to watch the kids, but it’s really about finding the right thing, because we've looked," the actress told Vanity Fair. "I don’t think people want to see people who are really together intimate on-screen. Maybe we have to play bad guys that try to kill each other, so it’s just fun and aggressive, not dealing with some man-woman deal.”

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Brad Pitt's Dad Babysits Knox as Brad, Angelina, Older Kids Travel

Apparently there's room for a few more guests at the $6.8 million Jolie-Pitt palazzo in Venice.

Introducing...Grandpa Pitt!

William and Jane Pitt touched down in Venice, Italy last week to visit with their son Brad, his love Angelina Jolie and their six kids.


Over the weekend, however, Pitt's parents were apparently on babysitting duty: as attested by photos at Radaronline, Jolie and Pitt took Shiloh, 3, Maddox, 8, Zahara, 4, and Pax, 6, for a quick trip to the south of France while twins Vivienne and Knox, 20 months, stayed behind.
On Sunday, William and Knox headed out onto one of the clan's favorite spots in the palace: the scenic balcony overlooking Venice's Grand Canal.

Knox wore a black hoodie and clutched a blankie as he showed his grandfather the sites.

In February, Jolie's father, actor Jon Voight, also visited with the family in the ancient Italian city.  Voight, 71 and Jolie, 34, had recently reconciled after a 7-year rift.

"It's nice to have something that's positive!" Voight, 71, told UsMagazine.com of getting back together with his once-estranged daughter. He says their boat ride down the ancient city's Grand Canal was "lovely...the weather wasn't so bad for the journey. It's a very beautiful trip. A lot of fun."


Last Friday, Knox and his famous mom Jolie made a comical blunder while enjoying the view: he dropped his stuffed toy bunny, which plunged into the water below.

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Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in Montenegro

Hollywood actors Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie were in the former Yugoslav republic of Montenegro on Tuesday in the medieval coastal town of Budva following a visit to Bosnian refugees.

The owner of the Splendid hotel near Budva told AFP that Brad Pitt knows Montenegro from when he shot one of his first films "The Dark Side of The Sun" there in 1988.
"Brad Pitt told me that he had wanted to show Montenegro to his wife as he had nice memories of Perast, Sveti Stefan and Kotor where he had shot one of his first movies, at the beginning of his career in 1980s," hotel owner Zarko Radulovic said.

"He told me they could bring the kids here for a vacation as they like it and the nature is nice."
The Hollywood couple were in Bosnia on Monday to visit internally displaced Bosnians still living in collective centres, often in appalling conditions, 14 years after the end of the war. Jolie is a goodwill ambassador for the UN's refugee agency UNHCR.

The actors are due to fly back to Italy later on Tuesday, where Jolie is filming "The Tourist" in Venice with director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, who made the critically-acclaimed German film "The Lives of Others" in 2007.

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Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt In Bosnia (PHOTOS)

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie took a break from Venice and work to visit Bosnian refugees this week, and now there are photos.

UNHCR goodwill ambassador Jolie and partner Pitt visited the village of Medjedja, near the eastern Bosnian town of Visegrad to, as the caption on the photos said, "spotlight the plight of 117,000 people who have not been able to return to their homes, even though the Bosnian war ended 15 years ago."

Sunday they spent the day on an Italian island with their kids for an Easter egg hunt.

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Brangelina rent private Easter island

Hollywood 'It' couple Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie rented an entire island so that their six children could celebrate Easter in peace.
 
The couple, nicknamed Brangelina by the tabloids, took their children to the Venetian island of San Servolo for a day of Easter activities on Sunday, reported Daily Mail online.


After catching a waterboat to the island, in the Venetian Lagoon, the family set up a picnic on the lawns and soaked up the Italian sun.

Maddox, 8, Pax, 6, Zahara, 5, Shiloh, 3 and twins Knox and Vivienne, 20 months, were amused by a hunt for eggs, carefully hidden by their bodyguards, and a game of football.
After the family day out the couple then left their brood behind and travelled to Bosnia as part of Jolie's role as a UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador.

They planned to visit refugees and tour homes that have not yet been rebuilt, despite war in the region ending 15 years ago.

The expedition came as the 34-year-old actress took a break from filming The Tourist, in which she co-stars with Johnny Depp, in Venice.

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Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt are suing tabloid over breakup story

Game on! Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are taking legal action against the British tabloid News of the World for its story last month that alleged the couple were working out details of a split.

"The News of the World has failed to meet our clients' reasonable demands for a retraction of and apology for these false and intrusive allegations which have now been widely republished by mainstream news outlets," a lawyer working for the couple in London said in a statement. "We have advised them to bring proceedings, which they have now done."

In a letter cited in that statement, Sorrell Trope, the divorce attorney whose name was mentioned in the NOTW article, denied that he was in touch with the couple.

The Jan. 24 article, which was picked up by the Drudge Report late Jan. 23, the night of the Screen Actors Guild Awards, immediately caused a rip in the celebrity space-time continuum. Then on Jan. 25, the Monday after the Globes, the Ministry of Gossip treated the claims as a total joke, much to the dismay of readers clicking through for hard news.

Hayley Barlow, a spokeswoman for the News of the World, had no comment on the court filing.

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Brad Pitt swaps Jennifer Aniston for Angelina Jolie on Top 12 Celebrity Scandals Of The Decade

Everyone loves a scandal, and this decade now ending featured no shortage of them. While we all liked to pretend that we had a new seriousness of purpose due to the demands of terrorism, war, economic collapse, and moral breakdown, in our dark heart of hearts we looked forward to nothing more than a new upskirt shot from Britney Spears. Here's a look back at the biggest pop culture scandals of the 2000s, encompassing sex, crime, and drugs -- all the old favorites.

Paris Hilton uses sex tape to launch her career: The glorious era of sex tape dissemination online was touched off by Hilton and her co-star Rick Salomon in 2003, coincidentally (or maybe not?) just before the premiere of her reality show The Simple Life. Never mind that the tape was hardly an advertisement for Hilton's bedroom talents -- she proved that the only bad publicity is none at all.

Phil Spector convicted of murder: The legend of record production had long been known as one of the biggest eccentrics in entertainment, but the weirdness took a very dark turn when a former B-movie actress named Lana Clarkson was shot and killed inside Spector's L.A. home. After one mistrial, Spector was finally convicted of Clarkson's murder earlier this year, a new jury finding his claim that the fatal wound was accidentally self-inflicted to be bogus.

Martha Stewart goes to federal prison: Could there have been a less likely jailbird? The queen of American good taste got in hot water with the Securities and Exchange Commission after she dumped some stock based on inside information. She spent several months behind bars in West Virginia introducing her fellow inmates to the joys of napkins folded into swan shapes, and has since resumed her status as the epitome of uptight perfectionism.

Brad Pitt swaps Jennifer Aniston for Angelina Jolie: Pitt's marriage to Aniston in 2000 looked like the perfect Hollywood pairing, so much so that when stories appeared a few years later suggesting that Pitt and Jolie were exhibiting scarily good chemistry on the set of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, most wrote it off as just gossip to hype the flick. But when the couple separated and Pitt immediately segued into a new relationship with serial adopter Jolie, it created shockwaves and bad blood that persist to this day. This triangle is still all over the tabloids.

Kate Moss photographed snorting cocaine: "Model Uses Drugs" is about as shocking a headline as "Dog Bites Man," but the thing about photographs is that they can be reprinted over and over again. Moss had already been under fire for her relationship with dissolute British rocker Pete Doherty when a U.K. tabloid published photos of her appearing to snort coke in 2005. Though she was not charged with a crime, the incident had a significant short-term impact on Moss's career, as she lost numerous contracts.

Chris Brown charged with beating Rihanna: Violence within relationships is sadly commonplace, but this incident in February 2009 was a rare case where stars of equal magnitude were both perpetrator and victim. The image of the cutest couple in pop was shattered when Brown assaulted Rihanna following an argument on the eve of the Grammy Awards. Rihanna seems to have come through with little damage; whether Brown, whose reputation prior to the beating had been excellent, can also recover is questionable.

Justin Timberlake coins the term "wardrobe malfunction": In the winter of 2004, Timberlake was an ex-boybander trying to update his image, while Janet Jackson was an aging (by pop standards) diva trying to stay relevant. This was probably not what either had in mind: during the halftime show of the 2004 Super Bowl, Timberlake ripped off the top of Jackson's outfit to reveal a bare breast beneath. The FCC was apoplectic, CBS was apologetic, and Timberlake's classic two-word explanation for what happened entered the language.

Michael Jackson charged with child molestation: The King of Pop had made an earlier allegation of molestation go away without the legal system getting involved, but he would not be so lucky in 2003 when he was officially charged in Santa Barbara County, Cal. The resulting trial was easily the biggest legal spectacle of the decade, but while Jackson was acquitted of all charges, the hit to his reputation was permanent and he would never return to his beloved Neverland Ranch.

Robert Blake accused of murdering his wife: In 2001, the brand new wife of the Hollywood veteran, a career con artist named Bonny Lee Bakley, was killed as the couple was leaving a restaurant. Blake was an immediate suspect but was not arrested until a year later. Blake was eventually acquitted, but later lost a civil suit for wrongful death filed by Bakley's children. The entire episode was sad and seedy.

R. Kelly's possibly underage sex tape partner: The R&B crooner had long had a reputation for favoring very young women, but the allegation that he had made a sex tape with a girl several years underage was a new level of icky. Kelly was charged with sexual relations with a minor and producing child pornography, but was finally acquitted after many years of delay. Kelly's music, once relatively mainstream, has gotten stranger and more kinky in recent years.

Britney Spears spends a year or so freaking out: After marrying Kevin Federline, the once glamorous pop princess seemed to adopt many of her hubby's slovenly ways (walking into public bathrooms barefoot being a particularly gross example), but it wasn't until after the marriage ended in 2006 that Spears really hit the skids. Lowlights of this period included the impulsive decision to shave her head, numerous photographs of her hitting the town wearing no panties under too-short skirts, a comatose performance at the MTV Video Music Awards, and a brief commitment to a psychiatric ward. It wasn't until she was placed under conservatorship, with her father managing her affairs, that Spears was able to regain some balance.

Paris Hilton goes to jail: Everybody knows that celebrities who are charged with nonviolent crimes can just make the problem disappear, right? Hilton may have counted on this when she violated the terms of a probation for DUI by driving with a suspended license, but a surprisingly no-nonsense judge actually forced her to spend a few weeks in jail in 2007. It was a hard stretch for Hilton and even harder for the Hollywood clubs and paparazzi who relied on her, but all managed to make it through OK.

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Angelina Jolie Won't Let Brad Pitt Go

For months now we've been hearing rumors about how Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are close to breaking up for good, yet it never seems to happen. A new report from In Touch formulates a new theory and why that keeps happening.

Even though their relationship is basically at its end, Angelina Jolie refuses to come to terms with it, and won't let Brad Pitt leave.

The tabloid uncovered new evidence that Brad Pitt has continued a relationship with ex-wife Jennifer Aniston that current lover Angelina Jolie finds distasteful. Angie found Brad texting Jen Aniston on October 26, after he waited until she fell asleep. She found out what happened by looking through his text message sent items the next day, and immediately confronted the 46 year old actor.

Brad didn't argue with her. He simply admitted what he'd done.

"Angelina flipped, then spent the rest of the day in tears," an insider said.

Despite the new tension, it didn't stop the two from appearing in public the same night.

They hit a movie premier that evening and followed it up with an appearance at Cecconi's in Hollywood. It didn't take long for the facade of tranquility to be damaged.

"Angelina's eyes were red, as if she was going to burst into tears at any minute," said a witness.

"You could cut the tension with a knife," said another onlooker.

The couple looked raw emotionally because of fighting from earlier that day.

"She told him that if he leavers her, she won't be able to cope," said the insider.

The next day Angelina decided on a different course of action.

"She's been sweetness and light, chatting with Brad and asking him about his current projects - all the things she hasn't shown an interest in in years."

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