Jolie twins 'due within fortnight'
Updated on 02 July 2008
Angelina Jolie is expected to give birth to twins within the next fortnight at a hospital in the South of France, doctors have said.
The 33-year-old Tomb Raider star arrived on Sunday by helicopter to the Santa Maria maternity unit of Lenval hospital in Nice - where she has an entire floor to herself.
She will be looked after by Dr Michel Sussman, who earlier gave a press conference on the A-list star's condition.
According to eye witnesses, partner Brad Pitt, 44, with whom Jolie has one child, has been visiting from the couple's temporary home in a 17th century villa not far away.
Pitt also has a room on the fifth floor of the building, which has been sealed off for their family and entourage and secured by bodyguards.
A spokeswoman for the hospital said Jolie is not "on the verge of giving birth," but that she will almost certainly remain in the hospital until she delivers her twins.
The UN goodwill ambassador has herself said the babies are due in August.
She and Pitt already have three adopted children - daughter Zahara, three, from Ethiopia, son Pax, four, from Vietnam and son Maddox, six, from Cambodia - and one biological daughter, Shiloh, two.
All eyes and lenses of the showbiz industry are expected to be on the hospital for the foreseeable future and the first pictures of the twins are expected to be the most expensive showbiz photo of the year.
Jolie and Pitt sold exclusive shots of their daughter Shiloh to People magazine for a reported $4 million (£2m) which they donated to charity.
British PR guru Max Clifford has predicted that pictures of the newborn babies could reach at least twice that amount, indicating that figures being mentioned went as high as $20 million (£10m).
However, obtaining them would be trickier in France, as the Hollywood couple would be able to take advantage of the country's strict privacy laws to keep matters in their own hands.
But such restrictions are unlikely to discourage photographers, according to Clifford.
He said: "Of course the stakes are high and this is probably going to be the most expensive set of baby pictures in history."
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