Angelina Jolie doesn't want her children to be actors

NEW YORK, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Angelina Jolie wants her children to pursue something other than acting.

The 40-year-old actress discussed her six kids in an interview Wednesday on the Today show. Jolie worked with several of her children on her movie Kung Fu Panda 3, but said she hopes her kids don't turn out to be actors.

"I hope not. We've always said if they're going to be actors I hope they do something [else first] and then be actors," the star said of herself and husband Brad Pitt, who share sons Maddox, Pax, Shiloh and Knox and daughters Zahara and Vivienne.

"It was so much fun," she added of working with Pax, Zahara, Shiloh and Knox. "What I think was so sweet about it was that they took it very seriously. They came in and said, 'I don't know if I can do this,' but [I] talked them through it."

Jolie said her children "don't really want to be actors" when confirming their involvement with Kung Fu Panda 3 this month. She and Pitt previously employed son Maddox as a production assistant on their film By the Sea.

"We want to make it a family affair and have the kids running in and out of set," the actor said at the movie's premiere. Jolie and Maddox are now working on an adaptation of First They Killed My Father set in his home country of Cambodia.

Jolie is daughter to actors Jon Voight and Marcheline Bertrand, and made her film debut at age 7 in the 1982 movie Lookin' to Get Out. Kung Fu Panda 3 opens in theaters Friday, and the actress is also slated for Salt and Maleficent sequels.

Lucy Liu, who voices Viper in the Kung Fu Panda movies, said she wants the series to be a "legacy" for her son Rockwell on the same Today episode. The films star Jack Black as the panda Po, and have earned a combined $1.3 billion at the box office.