Angelina's Doctor Calls Brad "My Assistant"; Mayor "Thrilled" by Twins' Nice Connection

Sun., Jul. 13, 2008 1:30 PM PDT by Ken Baker

AP Photo

Angelina Jolie's doctor, Michel Sussmann, held an impromptu press conference on the steps of the Lenval hospital on Sunday afternoon.

He said Brad Pitt and Angelina were as calm as could be.

During the labor and delivery, the couple "were talking, they were together," Sussmann (above left) told reporters outside the Fondation Lenval in Nice, France, where twins Vivienne Marcheline and Knox Leon were born Saturday evening. "It was an epidural, so [Angelina] was awake and speaking and laughing. They were happy."

Pitt never left Jolie's side—"He was my assistant!" Sussmann joked—and he even cut the babies' umbilical cords.

"He was...perfectly calm, totally determined, very pleased to be at the birth of his children, very moved and very emotional," the doctor said.

Asked whether the birth had been a textbook delivery, Sussmann replied that there were "absolutely no problems."

When will Jolie and the babies leave the hospital? "I don't know," he said. "She will stay for a few days. You know, in Europe it isn't like in the United States, where the patients go home after three days. They will stay a bit longer until everything is okay."

He added: "The babies are fine. The babies are with the mother and father and they are fine."

Also on Sunday, Christian Estrosi, the mayor of Nice, displayed one of the twins' birth certificates on the hospital steps.

"I'm very happy for Brad and Angelina and thrilled that their children will have a connection to our wonderful city of Nice forever," Estrosi told E! News Sunday afternoon in a phone interview.

The typed certificate revealed that Knox was born at 6:27 p.m. on July 12 and Vivienne was born a minute after.

The document contained the mayor's signature, as well as Papa Pitt's initials, the letters WBP representing his full name, William Bradley Pitt.

Estrosi arrived at the hospital at 3:24 p.m. to oversee the signing, with Knox's paperwork becoming the 3,702th registered birth certificate in Nice for 2008.

In welcoming the twins, Estrosi told reporters, "On behalf of the inhabitants of Nice, I congratulate the happy parents, the most famous couple of the world who have chosen our city for this happy event."