Angelina Jolie is starting to get pretty crotchety while waiting for her babies to be born – if you believe In Touch magazine and the Daily Mail. According to staffers at the hospital, Angelina is demanding special food, getting short with the staff, and laying about lazily. Yes, they’re implying a woman pregnant with twins that seem to be about half her total bodyweight is lazy for staying in bed.

Angelina Jolie is growing increasingly grouchy with staff while she waits to give birth to twins in a French hospital, according to a new report. The heavily-pregnant actress has been holed up in the private Lenval hospital in Nice for a week now ahead of her scheduled Caesarean section next Tuesday.

While staff there were amazed by her extreme politeness when she first arrived, Angelina’s mood has darkened over the last few days, American magazine In Touch Weekly has claimed. An insider told the publication: ‘She’s starting to feel that the staff are starstruck and not attentive enough. She’s throwing fits if she rings and they don’t come quick enough.’

Angelina has even insisted she be served salmon for lunch, despite the dish not being on the hospital menu. The source added: ‘And I don’t mean asked - demanded. The food at Lenval isn’t very good - it’s hospital food - and I think she was fed up. A staffer went out and bought some and it was made for her.’

The insider continued: ‘I think she’s in meltdown mode. She’s been getting upset if there’s not enough ice in her glass. ‘She’s not walking around anymore. She doesn’t even take a shower early in the morning. She just stays in bed, talking on her phone, typing on her computer, reading magazines and watching TV.’

[From the Daily Mail]

Well the absolute nerve. To think Angelina doesn’t rise EARLY in the morning to shower. Or walk around enough for the staff. Really, I doubt anyone as pregnant as she is would give a damn what the hospital thought about her. And I’m guessing a lot of women would be pretty cranky at this point. I know they say walking is good for inducing labor, but I’m guessing Angelina is probably supposed to be on bed rest. The “source” frames it as though she’s being lazy and just laying about.

And when you’re in the hospital, please tell me what else you’re supposed to do besides talk on the phone, work on the computer, read magazines, etc? Should she be out mowing their lawn? Perhaps grocery shopping? This whole story really irritates me. I’m sorry that Angelina is being grouchy with the staff, but it also sounds like they’re over analyzing her every move. Luckily it sounds like she’ll be out of there in a relatively short period of time.

Here’s Angelina and Brad at Cannes on May 15th. Images thanks to PR Photos.

Brad and Angelina on 1/27/08 when her pregnancy was just a rumor. Credit: PRPhotos
In the $6 million deal with People Magazine for the first photos of her rarefied twins, Jennifer Lopez reportedly stipulated that People never refer to her as “J. Lo” again.

The first photos of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s twins could fetch nearly three times the amount paid for J.Lo’s babies Max and Emme. And like Lopez, Brad and Angelina also have a moniker they’d like to shed in the deal. TMZ claims that bidding for the first photos of the fifth and sixth editions to the Brangelina clan has reached the astronomical price of $16 million. Angelina doesn’t want to put up with the blended name for her relationship any more and is throwing that into whichever contract she signs. She supposedly hates the nickname “Brangelina” and will strike it forevermore from the magazine that buys the rights to those coveted first photos:

A source in the know tells TMZ that one of the conditions of getting the J-P twins’ first pictures is that the winning mag is forbidden from using “Brangelina.” Multiple sources tell us the couple hates the moniker — but no one more than Angelina.

BTW — the bidding is now at $16 million. Take that Levi Alves McConaughey.

[From TMZ]

$16 million for photos of babies who are going to be stalked and photographed for the rest of their lives? At least it will probably all go to charity. It hardly seems worth it for the magazine it if you think about how much the babies are going to change in a few months. It’s also doubtful that whichever magazine(s) they’re featured in will sell well enough to justify that exorbitant amount. The glossies are said to be shelling out insane amounts of cash for baby and wedding photos in order to forge valuable relationships with the celebrities, not to necessarily recoup their investment in one issue.

I always thought Brangelina had a nice kind of ring to it and am surprised that it bugs Angelina so much. It’s fallen out of fashion recently, but we occasionally rely on it to write titles that are short enough to fit on our homepage. It’s kind of amusing that the name pisses Angelina off and now I want to use it more. It’s like a dumb nickname for the prom queen that seems benign but bugs the sh*t out of her. Of course you’re going to use it to refer to her behind her back whenever possible.

The hospital where Angelina Jolie is staying while she waits to give birth. Photos by WENN.
Last week some photos came out of a random pregnant woman lifting up her shirt for the paparazzi from the window of the gorgeous resort-like hospital on the French Riviera where Angelina Jolie is staying. I saw them on Just Jared, and although it was pretty obvious that it wasn’t Angelina they posted them anyway, which is what I would have easily done if we had a deal with that photo agency.

The guy posing with the smiling woman was a thin man in a white v-neck t-shirt whose face was covered. He could have easily passed for Brad Pitt if you squinted hard enough. The woman was a brunette and although the photos were faraway and very low resolution you could tell from her features and the size of her belly that it wasn’t Angelina. Angelina also has a big tattoo on her lower abdomen that would have been visible in the photos, as Just Jared mentions.

Even though not many people were convinced that was Angelina, the hospital where she is staying felt compelled to issue a statement that there’s no way you can see into her room from below. They say they put something on the window that makes it impossible to see in. It’s likely they’re trying to discourage some of the layabout photographers who are milling around the beach just waiting for a glimpse of the heavily pregnant star:

That wasn’t Angelina Jolie waving to fans from her hospital room last week.

Last Thursday, photos surfaced of a pregnant woman who resembled the actress, 33, at Lenval Hospital in Nice, France.

But a hospital rep tells the Associated Press: “It is impossible to see into Mr. Brad Pitt and Mrs. Angelina Jolie’s room. This is not Mr. Brad Pitt or Mrs. Angelina Jolie in them.”

The rep says that the windows of Jolie’s room have been covered with a special material to prevent any prying eyes.

On Tuesday, Pitt and son Pax, 4, visited Jolie, who has been resting and is being monitored by doctors in the seaside hospital.

[From US Weekly]

We published photos of the pigs on Brad and Angelina’s property on a slow news day, which gave me an excuse to talk about my harrowing experience with a family of wild boar, so of course a maybe-photo of Angie warrants discussion.

So far all that’s come out of Angelina in weeks is a very faraway picture of her outside. There are only a few photos of her kids and a mostly covered-up Brad Pitt dashing into the hospital visit her. I know right before my son was born my face was puffed up like a watermelon and I was huge. There’s like one photo of me at the time, and I would destroy it if the digital version were in my possession. Angelina’s arms are probably still skinnier than mine are now, so she’s not facing the same level of weight gain I had with just one baby, but who wants to get their photo taken right before they give birth? I would say that the paparazzi should pack it up and go home, but they probably assume that the minute they give up Angelina will emerge, and they’ll kick themselves for missing that money shot.

Even though I don’t know if she’s done it in the past, Jane Seymour seems like one of those people that’s always offering unsolicited advice and telling people what to do. I totally love her, and I can’t really put my finger on why I think this. There’s just something vaguely school marmish about her. In an attempt to prove me right (how very kind of you Jane) she’s decided to lecture Angelina Jolie about what she needs to be doing for her pregnancy – via OK! Magazine, the best doctor at all.

“My advice to her is to put some weight on,” the Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman star told OK!. “I think she needs to keep putting on weight so she can feed those babies. I don’t think she should think twice. She hasn’t put on enough weight.”

Seymour,57, says that when she had her twins, John and Kristopher, in 1995, it was a life threatening delivery.

“I nearly died having the twins,” she recalled. “I had preclampsia, which is toxemia, and I had to have an emergency C-section and I almost lost my life. So my advice to her [Jolie] is to listen to your doctors and if they say bed rest and they say blood pressure cuff every hour and they say whatever medication they say, you should take it very seriously.”

[From OK! Magazine]

I think the reason Jane Seymour’s comments annoy me isn’t that she’s wrong, but that there’s something about the way she’s phrased her words that implies she’s assuming Angelina isn’t doing these things, and isn’t taking her pregnancy seriously. Jolie is definitely very, very thin. But she seems to be very devoted to her kids – certainly enough that you’d think if her doctor told her it was medically necessary to gain weight, she’d do it to the best of her ability. There are some people out there who really can’t put on the pounds. I hate them with a fire I can’t explain. But I’m constantly told they’re out there.

It seems like Jane Seymour’s comments are coming from a good place, and she’s just offering her advice based on her very scary experience. Somehow it comes off sort of lecturing to me, but it’s probably just her way of trying to pass on some life experience.

Header of Jane Seymour at the “Reservation Road” premiere in Los Angeles on October 18th; Angelina Jolie is shown at Cannes for the “Kung Fu Panda” premiere on May 19th. Images thanks to PR Photos.

Though they haven’t even been born yet, the mayor of Nice, France is already bestowing quite a bit of praise on Brangelina’s upcoming double bundles of joy. He’s praised them quite a bit, and has announced that the children will be honorary citizens of Nice for the rest of their lives. They’ll also have the opportunity to apply for French citizenship when they turn 18.

They’ll always have Nice. Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s soon-to-be-born twins will always be considered honorary citizens of Nice, regardless of whether they opt to obtain French citizenship, the mayor of Nice said Friday.

“That is for the citizens of Nice a very great honor and a great satisfaction,” mayor Christian Estrosi said. “We are very happy for this choice of Mrs. Angelina Jolie and Mr. Brad Pitt and I want to say to them that I wish a lot of joy to them and the babies, and great success for all of their lives.”

The mayor affectionately called the twins “two little Nicois.”

Being born in France is not enough to confer citizenship. But according to the French Foreign Ministry website, the twins will have the option of obtaining French citizenship when they turn 18 as long as France has been their primary residence for at least 5 years after age 11.

“All their lives they will be Nicois and all their life they will be able to come to Nice and we will receive them with great honor,” Estrosi said. He was waiting eagerly to extend his congratulations on behalf of all the city’s residents.

[From the Huffington Post]

That’s really sweet. Somehow the mayor sounds so into it, I imagine him giving his speech with little squeals of delight or something. Angelina is expected to give birth in the next couple of weeks, but no one can really narrow it down beyond that. With twins it’s very rare to go full term, but her doctor has said she has a ways to go.

Brad has been bringing their children to visit her – in batches, since there’s a lot of them. Between all of their traveling, it seems like the whole bunch of them would be better off getting some kind of all-encompassing citizenship. I realize that doesn’t exist, but – as with most things - I’m pretty sure everyone is willing to make an exception for the Brangelinas.

Here’s what I’m told is Brad Pitt looking through the window at Lenval hospital on July 2nd. Header of the couple at the Changeling premiere in Cannes on May 20th. Images thanks to WENN.

When Angelina’s doctor announced earlier that he was going to make an announcement, as xiaoecho phrased it, some were worried, some expectant (like Angelina) and others rolled their eyes. The news is anti-climatic is no doubt in response to the immense clamoring for information from the press. He said she’s still pregnant, gave vague information as to when she’s due, and said she’s fine and will be in the hospital for a while. Her health is absolutely normal, according to her doctor:

“Everything is normal,” the obstetrician said in French, as he also said in English, “She is very well, and she’s okay.”

“It is simply a visit of surveillance, no birth,” Sussmann said of his patient, who entered the hospital over the weekend. “Brad and Angie want everyone to know that everything is going well.”

Saying that Jolie’s “very, very nice,” the doctor added, “She will stay in the hospital until the birth. I will stay with her.”

What he was not specific about was the due date. “This is something you can’t program, you never know for sure,” he said.

[From People.com]

US Weekly adds the detail that Angelina’s obstetrician Dr. Sussman said “in the weeks to come” when asked when she was due exactly. Her Kung Fu Panda co-star Dustin Hoffman said in an interview at Cannes that she was due August 19, but it is thought that may be a ruse to buy the actress some much needed privacy after the birth. She has said that she “plans to disappear for a month or so” after she gives birth. She’s disappeared for the past month, so she just might be able to manage it if she stays holed up in that immense villa. We’ll have to see when they announce the birth, because she may be planning to try and keep it a secret for as long as possible. Who can blame her? Show the love, Badettes.

Thanks to WENN for these photos of the hospital where Angelina is staying in Nice. It must suck there. Header image of Brad at the hospital thanks to Splash News.

Brad outside the hospital earlier today
Angelina Jolie arrived by helicopter last night to Lenval hospital on the French Riviera. She is said to be staying in the best room in their maternity ward to await the birth of her twins, thought to be boy and girl fraternal twins. Earlier reports had Angelina at the hospital for a scheduled rest period before the birth, but her doctor has announced a press conference for later this afternoon and outlets are buzzing that the babies may have already arrived. Angelina’s partner Brad Pitt was seen leaving the hospital earlier today with one of their children, perhaps for a quick visit to the nearby town for supplies:

Angelina Jolie’s obstetrician, Dr. Michel Sussmann, who is watching over the 33-year-old actress at a French Riviera hospital where she is expected to give birth, called a news conference for later Wednesday afternoon.

Would he announce that her twins had been born? That remained a mystery; the hospital wouldn’t say.

Jolie’s partner, Brad Pitt, was seen leaving the seafront Lenval hospital Wednesday morning with one of their four young children.

The hospital announced Tuesday that Jolie had checked into its Santa Maria maternity clinic to be kept under doctors’ watch and rest before she gives birth.

A hospital spokeswoman said the births were “not for right away,” but spokeswoman Nadine Bauer said Jolie would almost certainly stay in the clinic until then.

Nice Matin, the local newspaper, reported that Jolie has the best room in the hospital, on the fifth floor, with an “unobstructed view” over the Bay of Angels. It said she arrived by helicopter, landing Sunday afternoon on the hospital’s roof. The newspaper said the actress reserved four rooms on the maternity ward, with a bodyguard keeping watch.

[From AP via Huffington Post]

We’ll have to wait and see what Angelina’s doctor says, but why else would he hold a press conference - to ask for privacy? Giving birth is one situation where I definitely wouldn’t be ashamed to take advantage of preferential treatment if I was rich and famous. You have enough stress to go through having to give birth or get major surgery if you’re having a c-section, every woman should be pampered and attended to while they’re in labor. It sound like things are all set up for Angelina at the hospital and maybe we’ll soon hear that her babies have arrived.

Another day, another “Angelina had the babies rumor,” except this time it’s a little closer to her due date and might actually be true. A French gossip magazine called Closer, which doesn’t look much different from US Magazine Star, has a super brief mention that Angelina had the babies. Even though I can’t understand French and have to rely on a translator, it’s easy to tell that it’s short on details and asks people to credit them with the news.

Here’s the rough translation from an online translator:

English automated translation: Exclusively world-wide, Closer is in a position to announce you that Pretty Angelina would have delivered this morning in a French hospital! The star would have returned last night in work room. All forbidden reproduction without the mention of the site closermag.fr

French version: En exclusivité mondiale, Closer est en mesure de vous annoncer qu’Angelina Jolie aurait accouché ce matin dans un hôpital français ! La star serait rentrée hier soir en salle de travail. Toute reproduction interdite sans la mention du site closermag.fr

[From Closer]

So she delivered, but there are no details on if she had a boy and girl as expected, where she was even in general, or if was scheduled or unexpected. Just Jared says that it claims she went into labor on Monday night (I think that’s what the “work room” translation is referring to) and gave birth this morning.

It could be true, but it seems like they’d have a little something more to report if it was, and wouldn’t be so quick to insist that they’re credited with this vague exclusive. The website for Closer magazine features some of their other stories about celebrities, including the familiar “beach bodies” and “scary skinny” pictorials. The gossip press isn’t that much different in France it seems, including the penchant to invent stories in order to get publicity. We’ll have to see, but this sounds this total bs to me or they would have a general location of the hospital and/or the sex of the babies.

Update Thanks to commenters Gena and Elisha below for pointing me to this AP article which confirms that Angelina is in a hospital in Nice. There is no news as to whether she’s given birth yet and it’s phrased as if she’s waiting to give birth and her admittance was planned. She is thought to have been on bed rest for a few weeks up until this point.

PARIS - Angelina Jolie has gone into a hospital in the south of France where she expects to give birth to twins.

Nadine Bauer, a spokeswoman for the Lenval Hospital in Nice, says Jolie is fine and that everything is going well. She said the actress’ admittance to the hospital’s maternity wing had been planned for some time.

Bauer said Jolie will almost certainly remain in the hospital until she gives birth. She said Jolie was admitted so she could be kept under surveillance and not to give birth immediately.

Bauer would not say when Jolie was admitted.

[From News.Yahoo.com]

So how many paparazzi and amateur photographers are going to be crowded around that hospital now? Why would they confirm that she’s there, though? It seems like they would refuse to comment out of respect for her privacy. Maybe Angelina should have rented all the equipment to set up a temporary hospital at that villa where she’s staying.

Update 2: In Touch is reporting that Angelina has checked into the hospital, but is “just resting” dyring a pre-planned visit and has not given birth yet. Her doctor us said to be flying in “later this week”

In Touch has learned that the Wanted star did check into the Hospital Lenval’s Santa Maria clinic in Nice, France, on June 30. “Ms. Jolie came to the hospital last night as part of a pre-planned rest period, before she gives birth,” Nadine Bauer, spokeswoman for the hospital tells In Touch. “The visit has been planned for a long time; there are no complications. She is just resting.” Angelina’s babies are expected to be delivered by French doctor Michele Sussmann and her regular ob/gyn Jason Rothbart, who is due to fly to Europe later this week.

[From In Touch]

We haven’t seen Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt in so long that I was starting to believe the conspiracy theories that she gave birth to the twins, her assistant blabbed to the press, and then her camp tried to buy her some much-needed privacy by claiming someone was posing as her assistant and leaking fake stories. In Touch has some faraway photos of what looks like Angelina still looking pregnant that were taken four days ago. She could have just stuffed a basketball up there and walked out on the terrace between nursing sessions, it’s hard to tell.

It looks like one of the photographers camped out on the French Riviera waiting for something to happen got a coveted photo of Angelina and didn’t have to resort to taking pictures of pigs. You can see the photo at In Touch.

Here’s Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman and Fabio Volo at a Kung Fu Panda photocall in Rome yesterday without still-pregnant Angelina. You can tell Jack Black is the father of a newborn because he sure looks tired. Thanks to PRPhotos.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie on 2/2/08 before she announced her pregnancy. This was Brad’s brief “scruffy period”
Since we covered the pigs on their property yesterday we may as well cover this: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have donated a million to Iraqi children affected by war. The money will be donated through their Jolie-Pitt foundation, which they funded with $8 million in 2006:

The Jolie-Pitt Foundation will provide $500,000 for school supplies and education programs for refugee children in Iraq and $500,000 for American children who either lost a parent deployed in Iraq or have a parent serving in that country.

The donations for American children will go to a tutoring initiative at the Armed Services YMCA Operation Hero Program…

“My visit [to Iraq] left me even more deeply convinced that we not only have a moral obligation to help displaced Iraqi families, but also a serious, long-term, national security interest in ending this crisis,” she wrote in an op-ed for the Washington Post.

Jolie, 33, and Pitt, 44, forked over $8 million for their foundation in 2006. That year, the foundation gave $1 million gifts to Doctors Without Borders (International Division) and the Global AIDS Alliance.

[From US Weekly]

Let me just anticipate some of the comments this is going to draw from people who seem to have ire for them no matter what they do: “They’re doing it for publicity,” “They didn’t need to issue a press release,” “They are trying to control the press about them,” “They want to seem like martyrs,” etc.

As I said in a post we just published about Ben Affleck visiting the Congo, at least he’s doing it. Angelina has mentioned that she doesn’t give a rats ass that people hate on her (obviously I’m paraphrasing) and that all the harsh feelings she elicits indicate that she’s doing something right and that she’s “standing strong for something I believe in.”

In a way, I know what people mean about how it seems there’s a story every couple of months about the charity these two do. At least they’re doing charity, though, and maybe it’s like their kids’ posed photos in the glossies: they’re damned if they do, damned if they don’t. It’s an important cause, and one that could use the attention. Ben Affleck practically says he’s willing to paint a target on his head if it gets people the help they need. Maybe Brad and Angelina feel the same way. They did duck so far out of the way that the paparazzi are taking photos of wild animals, though.