Jolie tigeress in <i>Kung Fu Panda</i>

Los Angeles (Reuters): In her first movie deal since going to Africa to give birth, Angelina Jolie will co-star as a tiger in the upcoming kids film Kung Fu Panda for DreamWorks Animation SKG, the studio said. The Academy Award-winning actress will supply the voice of Tigress, a martial-arts master who helps train the title character, Po the Panda, played by Jack Black, in the ways of kung fu, DreamWorks yesterday said. The all-star cast of the computer-animated comedy, due to hit theaters in May 2008, also will feature the voice talents of Jackie Chan, Lucy Liu, Dustin Hoffman and Ian McShane.

Jolie, 31, and Black last worked together voicing two of the lead characters, Lola and Lenny, in DreamWorks' 2004 hit underwater adventure Shark Tale. Weeks after returning to Los Angeles from the African nation of Namibia, where she gave birth to her first biological child, daughter Shiloh Nouvel, with off-screen paramour Brad Pitt, Jolie is letting little grass grow under her feet. Coming off the success of last year's action hit Mr&Mrs Smith, pairing her with Pitt, Jolie recently completed work on The Good Shepherd, to be released this year, and is working on the Robert Zemeckis-directed Beowulf, due out next year.