Nicole Kidman has lastly discovered a option to impress that trickiest of demographics: her 16-year-old daughter. “The opposite night time, I used to be interviewed by Amelia, the hen nuggets,” she says, with a smirk. The 57-year-old Australian megastar is speaking about Amelia Dimoldenberg, the comic and host of the video sequence Rooster Store Date, who buttonholed her for a fast chat on the purple carpet at an awards bash in London. “That’s all my daughter cared about, and I liked that,” Kidman goes on. “That to her was like, ‘Oh my God!’ She wasn’t concerned about anyone else. After which I noticed the issues that she did, Amelia, and she or he’s actually humorous. I liked her with Billie Eilish, and Andrew Garfield and her was so humorous. And now I’ve to go for a date along with her. I’m asking for the date.”
Kidman might have a repute on display for taking part in steely and impenetrable, however away from it, she has a extra playful, even sillier, facet. That appeal is entrance and centre once we meet in a London resort for the Observer’s You Ask the Questions function, made up of submissions from associates, collaborators and readers. Kidman wears a boxy gray go well with from Tod’s with a prim, white shirt buttoned to the neck and glinting black loafers. Her auburn hair is parted within the center and falls to simply beneath her shoulders. It’s a critical look, however Kidman laughs rather a lot: it’s virtually the punctuation of her paragraphs. And she or he clearly appears to get pleasure from herself in the present day, extending our allotted time and saying, as I’m lastly being bustled to the exit by the PR: “I want we might have had extra readers’ questions. Throw yet one more at me. Come on, yet one more!”
Kidman is on a formidable run of labor. Final 12 months, she cemented her place because the doyenne of status tv with the Netflix whodunnit The Excellent Couple. Eager-eyed viewers might have famous some familial resemblances to a few of Kidman’s different TV hits, comparable to Huge Little Lies, The Undoing and 9 Excellent Strangers: the dysfunctional rich household, design-porn places, themes of homicide, betrayal, infidelity. However Kidman, who is commonly concerned in adapting the supply materials and handpicking the female-led groups, lends these tasks an unmistakable glamour and heft. And she or he’s landed on a magic formulation: The Excellent Couple topped the Netflix charts for weeks.
Extra surprising although is Kidman’s wild and kinky new movie, Babygirl. Within the erotic thriller, directed by Halina Reijn, she performs Romy, the sort of chilly protagonist we’d recognise from her: a hyper-competent CEO of a robotics firm with a doting husband (Antonio Banderas) and a number of swish houses. However Romy is unfulfilled, definitely sexually. She tentatively begins a wierd flirtation with a twentysomething intern (the British actor Harris Dickinson) that develops right into a sweaty, BDSM-tinged affair that would implode her perfect-ish life.
Reijn, who was a well known actor within the Netherlands earlier than changing into a director, wished Babygirl to be a contemporary, feminist tackle the attractive, and sometimes sexist, motion pictures she was obsessive about within the Eighties and 90s: 9½ Weeks, Injury and Fatal Attraction. She wrote the script, making it intensely private whereas additionally relating broader inequalities, notably the orgasm hole, the disparity within the variety of orgasms women and men report throughout straight intercourse.
“Nicole watched my movie Intuition, which led us to have our first assembly the place we talked about doubtlessly doing a mission collectively,” Reijn tells me. “Afterward, once I started writing the script for Babygirl, Nicole was undoubtedly in my thoughts. I felt she could be one of many few individuals who would convey the braveness to a personality like this. It’s not a really likable character from the beginning. Romy has quite a lot of layers and you’ve got to have the ability to play all these totally different roles.”
For Kidman, Babygirl is a return to the daring, auteur-led work that has additionally been a recurring theme in her profession. She has by no means been scared to take dangers and defy expectations, notably when she signed up with then-husband Tom Cruise to make the 1999 erotic psychodrama Eyes Large Shut, which might be Stanley Kubrick’s final movie. The shoot lasted for greater than 15 months, a file. She adopted that by showing on the Donmar Warehouse in David Hare’s play The Blue Room, directed by Sam Mendes, a manufacturing wherein she was briefly nude.
After I inform Kidman that The Blue Room remains to be referenced as a landmark theatre second, she goes coy. “It’s? Oh that’s superb,” she replies. “I simply wished to work with Sam and so I used to be right here in London on the Kubrick and I might have quite a lot of day off. So I’d drive in and go and see performs, watch movies, meet individuals and simply have enjoyable. And out of it got here Sam, Patrick Marber – I used to stroll his canine with him. I met Jez Butterworth, David Hare, who wrote not solely The Blue Room, however then The Hours and gave me spectacular roles. Like actually mind-blowingly good roles.”
Babygirl, although, is one thing totally different: essentially the most uncovered and susceptible she has ever felt, Kidman believes. Partially, it is because Reijn usually lingers on intense closeups, so we see Romy when she’s pretending to climax, when she actually does and, in medical lighting, when her face is injected with Botox. When the movie was chosen for the Venice movie competition final 12 months, Kidman admits that she began freaking out a little bit. “Once you take it to a competition of that calibre, it’s massively irritating,” she says. “And also you’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, this may go actually pear-shaped…’ I imply, actually pear-shaped, particularly with a movie like that. So yeah, I didn’t know what would occur in Venice, so I used to be getting in there, going, ‘Far out, I’m scared.’”
Kidman received the prize for greatest actress in Venice, and she is going to most likely observe that with at the least an Oscar nomination. “I’ve been receiving the reactions, and it’s so fascinating, as a result of they run the gamut, with individuals going: ‘I used to be actually into it’, ‘I used to be actually turned on’, ‘I used to be actually disturbed’,” she says. “It’s loopy, as a result of often there’s a specific finite response that you simply really feel. However so many individuals have totally different… They viscerally reply, in a great way. It’s additionally simply fashionable, I feel. There’s quite a lot of younger folks that simply appear to essentially find it irresistible. They actually get it.”
Kidman smiles, takes a sip of espresso. “Due to the size of my profession,” she continues, “I’ve had some highs and lows, however that is undoubtedly a excessive.”
The expertise of Babygirl has excited Kidman to maintain pushing. At dwelling, she leads a quiet life: she lives along with her husband, the nation singer Keith City, and their two daughters, Sunday and Religion, outdoors Nashville (she additionally adopted two kids with Cruise). However that stability permits her to take extra dangers in her profession decisions. “It’s why I nonetheless need to work,” she says. “The factor that lets me down is my physicality. I want I used to be extra sturdy and resilient than I’m, as a result of there are occasions when my very own human limitations set in, and I am going, ‘Oh, what a pity.’ As a result of there’s an abundance of alternative in all elements. The place to go. What to do. Who to be with. be on this world. I like that, and it’s finite.”
Kidman leaves a mysterious pause and laughs, “Possibly.”
Babygirl is in cinemas from 10 January
Hugh Jackman
Actor
If anybody epitomises the phrase “attempt something as soon as” it’s Nicole Kidman. My query is… Nic, what would you not even attempt as soon as?
Nicely, I’ve skydived at night time, so there’s nothing sport-wise. I’m just about up for making an attempt something as soon as, Hugh is aware of that, I’m sport for many issues. So I can’t consider something. Is that loopy? [Pause] I truly wouldn’t do Everest. There you go. I’m by no means going to do Everest. I simply don’t suppose I’d make it to the highest. As a result of regardless that I’ve a dangerous facet, I’m cautious. And that wouldn’t really feel good, proper?
And I don’t suppose I’d race on motorbikes. I’ll go on the again of a motorcycle, however I don’t suppose I’d race them.
Iain Glen
Actor
You could have at all times been so distinctive everytime you carry out within the theatre, however they’re fairly uncommon outings for you. Why is that?
Due to the rigorous schedule that it requires. It’s eight exhibits per week. And I’ve achieved it with kids, however proper now with youngsters? No, there’s simply that factor of needing to be on. And as a lot as individuals say: “Doing a play, it’s only a efficiency at night time and two exhibits on Wednesdays and Saturdays.” It truly isn’t. It’s a large thoughts dedication, and that’s actually robust. However completely, when it’s simply Keith and I collectively [at home], that may be a unique perspective on it.
Reese Witherspoon
Actor
Of all the characters you’ve created, is there one that you simply’d actually wish to revisit? Possibly you concentrate on it greater than the others?
Really the character I might love to return to is the character in The Others [the 2001 gothic horror directed by Alejandro Amenábar], Grace. As a result of I really feel like The Others will get missed and I liked that character.
Happiest second of your life?
Nameless
Oh, delivery of my kids. Yeah, past, no query, no query. So my husband whispering in my ear whereas I’m pushing [laughs].
SJ Watson
Creator of Earlier than I Go to Sleep
I used to be fortunate sufficient to satisfy you through the filming of Earlier than I Go to Sleep and it appears to me that there are two distinct elements of what you do. First there may be the making of the work, which should require excessive ranges of emotional depth and vulnerability. However then inevitably you grow to be the general public face of it, which I think about requires the alternative. How do you navigate these two totally different elements of being “Nicole Kidman” – being an artist, whereas additionally being well-known?
I’ve been doing this since I used to be 14 – which is insane – so I’ve many, many extra years of being well-known than I do of not. And I’ve realized learn how to have a reasonably steady, wise life, which I do know sounds boring, however my inventive life is something however that. So the steadiness of my dwelling, my household, and who I’m needs to be very, very sturdy for me to go off and do the issues that I do.
And it’s most likely why I search one thing like Babygirl, as a result of I like with the ability to push the boundaries in my inventive life, however then under no circumstances in my dwelling life. And it actually may be very a lot a easy life. I dwell in Nashville, I don’t dwell in an enormous metropolis. I dwell in a quiet place, and I like climbing and I like horses and I like nature, and I like my children and my husband. And it’s that straightforward till it isn’t [laughs].
Liane Moriarty
Creator of Huge Little Lies
What do you miss most about Australia if you haven’t been again for some time?
I had a really uncommon journey again [in September] due to my mom’s demise. So I miss my mother and father now, and it’s been a tough street with that, as a result of I’m at all times used to going to their home, to being with my mum once I go there, and never having that now makes it an entire totally different place and it takes on a really, very totally different that means to me.
However I miss the seaside. We don’t dwell close to a seaside. I miss my associates, I miss the seafood. I miss my sister and with the ability to go over to her home as a result of she has six children, and simply with the ability to be with them. And there’s my aunts and my greatest pal since I used to be 4, Annette. So I most likely miss my household essentially the most once I’m away from Australia. And the humour, as a result of there’s a very, very dry sense of humour which has similarities to the British humour. So I miss that barely irreverent, poke-fun-at-yourself factor.
I used to be born in America, however I’ve acquired very a lot Aussie blood. Gum bushes and Vegemite and the shark alarm on the seaside, and we’d simply be like, “Yeah, no matter!” Zinc cream on our noses, plenty of freckles, fish and chips… It was a incredible upbringing: we’d go right down to the seaside at 7am, we’d take our umbrella, and you’ll spend the entire day on the seaside, and also you’d order a burger, and also you’d sit there, a burger with beetroot. And for a fair-skinned woman, that’s a factor. I’d be coated in white zinc cream, however I’d get sunburned, and I’d peel my nostril till it bled. Horrible, horrible!
In order that was my upbringing: barefoot, operating via the bush and coated in leeches, leaping in swimming holes. A very good Aussie life, and that’s why I can experience horses. All of that, I wouldn’t change it.
Naomi Watts
Actor
Your mum [who was a nursing instructor and member of the feminist Women’s Electoral Lobby in Australia] was a outstanding girl: sturdy, variety, didn’t endure fools. I see a lot of her in you. What components of her do you see in your self? What classes from her would you wish to cross on to your daughters?
Analytical pondering, essential pondering. She was at all times the neatest girl within the room, which isn’t me, however I aspire to it. She would learn on a regular basis. She was an enormous believer in schooling. She would like to debate issues from all sides in order that you would actually solidify why you felt one thing. I so recognize that. She would problem you. She wasn’t afraid to let you know that you weren’t good, or that you simply wanted to tug your head in, or that you simply wanted to attempt tougher, otherwise you wanted to take it straightforward.
One of many final issues she mentioned to me was: “Care for your self, Nicky”, which was mentioned not as a closing goodbye, but it surely was simply mentioned in considered one of our hour-long cellphone conversations. So I might love to have the ability to cross on the maternal love that she needed to my daughters, and the resilience, and the power additionally to be in any room with any individual with out judgment. And so they’re already exhibiting indicators of it. They hear they usually have big empathy, which I like. They love animals. My mom liked animals. To the purpose that we gave them human attributes. So my canine is known as Julian. I feel having an animal as a baby is so essential, since you be taught to handle one thing and lift one thing with tenderness. So all of that.
Quote from the 1996 film The First Wives Club: “There are solely three ages for girls in Hollywood: babe, district legal professional and Driving Miss Daisy.” To what extent is that this nonetheless true?
Keri
We’re making an attempt to interrupt that. I’m actually decided for that to not be true. Babygirl hopefully is a part of breaking that mould, and making an attempt to assist feminine administrators signifies that might be modified finally. As a result of the extra we’ve the feminine voices in equal numbers in our cinema world, the extra we’ll have tales advised that break that mould.
Ali Smith
Creator
In 2015 in London I used to be fortunate sufficient to see you give some of the quietly arresting dwell performances I’ve but seen by anybody, if you performed Rosalind Franklin [the British chemist whose work was central to the discovery of the structure of DNA] in Anna Ziegler’s play, {Photograph} 51. After you’ve performed an individual night time after night time, dwelling and inhaling entrance of an equally dwell and respiratory viewers, does that individual (particularly when you’re taking part in an actual individual relatively than a fictional one) merely go away you fully – or is there nonetheless a residue of Ziegler’s Franklin someplace in you even now?
My father was a scientist. He was a biochemist, and so the concept of girls in science not being recognised for his or her contributions resonated deeply. I nonetheless really feel very unhappy for her that she was hoodwinked out of her discovery. I additionally hated that she died of ovarian most cancers at 37. She discovered anyone she was concerned about, after which subsequently died. So I feel as a result of my mom had breast most cancers, there’s at all times one thing there the place I am going… [intake of breath]. So there’s many elements of her life, however the concept of championing underdogs is a theme that I get pleasure from.
Michael Grandage
Director
We’ve collaborated on a play [Photograph 51] and made a movie collectively [Genius], and in each I used to be conscious it was essential to your course of to steadiness the seriousness of what you’re doing, whereas sustaining a component of enjoyable. As your profession develops, does one grow to be extra essential than the opposite?
The extra relaxed you’re, and playful, the higher you’re as a human. So I attempt to be in a state of playfulness once I’m on a set, as a result of we’re there to play and uncover. I don’t have hassle accessing the deep feelings, so I actually attempt to search out the humour and the playfulness, as a result of most likely my nature is geared in the direction of the extra critical. In order that’s why I’m at all times like, “Nicely, now let’s play.” And I like to have enjoyable, and I like to snort.
Elin Hildebrand
Creator of The Excellent Couple
Would you please describe why working with a feminine director is essential to you, particularly in mild of the extraordinary sexual scenes in Babygirl. How did Halina Reijn’s directing have an effect on your efficiency?
I don’t suppose I might have given the efficiency with a male director. She was the one which wrote it. She was the one which understood it. A person directing this, it wouldn’t have been the identical, as a result of he can’t truly be in my physique, however she will. We share that kind, and so we’ve the power to speak telepathically virtually, with an understanding of what our our bodies will do. And all our bodies are totally different, however there’s a safeness, and there’s a secrecy virtually to the sexuality that needed to be shared. And that’s why it was a really, very, very totally different expertise for me.
Have you ever ever turned down a job after which actually regretted it? If that’s the case, what was it?
Martin McDonald
Sure, in fact. However no, I can’t say, as a result of as soon as a job is claimed by one other actor, that’s simply the best way it’s. That’s the destiny of the movie gods. However there’s undoubtedly ones the place I’ve gone: “Oh, that may have been good to have the ability to try this.” And there’s many occasions I haven’t been in a position to, or I’ve chosen household, and in order that’s by no means a remorse.
So there’s no remorse there, however it might have been attention-grabbing to play it, however you may play it in your thoughts. That’s why I’m an enormous believer in making an attempt to lucid dream. I like lucid dreaming. I found it as a child, the place I might go: “OK, my actual life proper now shouldn’t be the life I need to be dwelling. So I’m going to shut my eyes and attempt to dwell the life I need to be dwelling in my goals.” And I might actually, actually attempt.
And I used to suppose: “Oh, I’m the one individual on this planet that may do that.” And I couldn’t at all times do it – however I might additionally get up in the midst of a dream and go: “I don’t like how that is going. I’m going to attempt to change the ending now.” And I’’d put myself again to sleep and alter the ending.
Mark Sturdy
Actor
As somebody with some expertise of taking part in the villain, would you say you or Hugh Grant had been the higher Paddington baddie?
Hugh Grant, no query, however I’d like us each to be baddies collectively. We have to be. However Hugh is jaw-droppingly sensible, and I like him. Discuss irreverent. Even the opposite night time on the Governors awards, he and Richard Curtis introduced the home down, they’re unstoppable. Come on, who can try this? That’s simply comedic brilliance, the 2 of them, taking the piss out of one another.
Does being a mum of two teenage daughters affect your number of movie/TV roles, and if that’s the case, how? What roles are you most proud to share with them?
Deb
Positively, once they had been younger, I did Paddington for them. I did Completely happy Toes. I did issues that they might actually love. My daughter, Sunday, now desires Huge Little Lies [season] three, so she’s been a large affect on that. She was like: “No, it’s a must to do that.” And she or he was the engine behind it.
Stephen Campbell Moore
Actor
Hey Nicole! Are you able to discuss a bit about working as producer and actor on the identical mission and the way every of these two roles can improve or inhibit the opposite?
I really feel just like the director needs to be the chief, and it’s a must to be a part of their troupe. You’ll be able to’t be telling them what to do. So within the lead-up, the pre-production and the post-production, I’ll assist. However I actually attempt to keep in my place as an actor throughout manufacturing.
Nicole, do you could have a favorite Keith City track, and why? Does Keith have a favorite of all of your motion pictures?
Jeanie Mackinder
He has a brand new album out, Excessive, and I actually really feel him in it. He has quite a lot of actually lovely songs: Messed Up As Me, I actually love; Dodge in a Silverado, which is attractive when you like nation music. However oh wow, I don’t suppose I can reply for him. He was fairly fascinated by Dogville. He liked Moulin Rouge!. Lifeless Calm as a result of he went and noticed that, and he didn’t know me then. He watched Huge Little Lies and says it was painful due to seeing what I used to be going via. In order that, for him, was an uncommon expertise.
Susanne Bier
Director
Do you could have any particular rituals that it’s a must to do each time earlier than you go on set/begin a brand new movie?
Earlier than I begin it, I’ve to do all my prep in order that I really feel that I’m coming in prepared so I can discard it. However I can’t begin one thing feeling like I’m on the again foot. And once I’m truly filming quite a lot of occasions, if there’s an ocean, I’ll go and get within the ocean, even when it’s 5 within the morning. As a result of I like to put the saltwater on my physique, even when it’s for 5 seconds. Even higher if it’s chilly. Even in Cape Cod, once we had been capturing on The Excellent Couple, I’d go dive within the ocean the place they’d the large shark signal saying: “Don’t swim.” I’d simply ignore that. I wasn’t swimming laps, however I simply love placing my head below. And I liked having a fast dip up in Monterery once we had been doing Huge Little Lies. Meryl Streep could be like: “You didn’t simply go within the ocean then.” And it’s the Pacific, so it’s actually chilly.
David Thomson
Movie critic
Which of your tasks appeared essentially the most harmful on the time, and now wanting again which feels essentially the most scary?
Babygirl truly now, wanting again, I am going: “Nicely, that was extra scary than I realised.” As a result of I didn’t see it as scary in any respect. Like in any respect. I didn’t see Delivery as one thing that could possibly be interpreted the best way it was interpreted. I simply noticed it as a dissertation on grief. However once I look again at, say, working with Stanley [Kubrick], that appeared prefer it was going to be extremely intimidating and horrifying, and it was most likely some of the nurturing locations I’ve been.
Isn’t that loopy? That’s loopy. That’s why I’ve such affection for him, as a result of we had an identical mindset, only a approach of approaching life. He was mischievous, discuss playful. Stanley was actually playful with us. Normally you’re racing in opposition to the clock, however Stanley wouldn’t permit time to dictate. And that’s fairly fabulous.
And once I look again, I don’t suppose I minded how lengthy it took, as a result of when you’re combating in opposition to a state of affairs, it’s going to be torturous. The acceptance of it permits it to be after which you may get pleasure from it. And we’re right here to have a great life. You’ll be able to select the torture of it, or you may settle for what it’s and take it for what it’s. That’s very a lot my father. I don’t at all times do it, however I attempt.
Sam Mendes
Director
I had the pleasure of watching you grow to be an incredible stage actor throughout rehearsals for The Blue Room in 1998… What do you get out of acting on stage that you simply don’t get out of movie and tv?
The immediacy. Absolutely the right-here, right-now immediacy, which is addictive. And I do suppose theatre is the longer term, partly as a result of when issues like AI have gotten so essential, I truly suppose flesh and blood and seeing individuals and smelling them and watching their pores and skin color change, and the tears come out of their eyes – which is why I like small theatres – I feel that’s going to grow to be an increasing number of highly effective sooner or later. I hope it’s. In order that’s why I need to do extra of it. And I feel it’s extremely essential, the humanness of it. It’s deeply human, theatre.
Halina Reijn
Director
As an actress, I’ve labored with tons of of actors and witnessed many various approaches to “the work”. Once you got here to me, you had been so nicely ready, along with your binder, notes, questions and deep understanding of the script and the character Romy, which I liked and associated to so very a lot. So on the one hand you’re insanely nicely ready, however on the opposite you permit your self to be totally within the second. Are you able to clarify the way you steadiness the 2?
As a result of when you’re in it, your job is to be fully in it on the set. If the scene is written for it to be sunshine, and it’s pouring with rain, you go along with the rain. You don’t get caught on something that you simply imagined, ready, as a result of in any other case that’s going to kill you. However the preparation offers you the character. So Romy needed to be in my mobile make-up, however then I needed to be fully open to being modified or no matter was coming at me, both from the opposite actors or from the setting, in order that then that may bleed into what was taking place now. As a result of that’s extra attention-grabbing than something I might think about or plan, proper?
I noticed Lars Von Trier’s Dogville as a teen in 2003. It stays some of the surprising movies I’ve ever watched. What are your strongest recollections of constructing the film?
James Vinall
I simply keep in mind arriving in Trollhättan in Sweden, and Lars was there. And we had been all dwelling in a little bit visitor home: Lauren Bacall and Patricia Clarkson and Paul Bettany. It was snowing on a regular basis and it might get darkish by 1pm and Lars could be like: “OK, we’re capturing within the morning, after which we’re having peach schnapps within the afternoon.” I simply keep in mind my agent on the time noticed what was going to be the movie, the units and he was like: “No, you can’t do that.” And I used to be like: “I’m completely doing it.” And it was loopy however beautiful, simply because it was so unusual, and Brechtian. I used to be simply grateful that someway he was given the cash to make that movie, proper? In all probability wouldn’t be given it in the present day.
I might hike these mountains in Trollhättan. I’d placed on my snow footwear, and exit as a result of we weren’t capturing within the afternoon. And I wrote a script once I was there, which I’ve nonetheless acquired to complete. It’s truly a extremely good concept, however I simply by no means fairly completed it. It’s a horror movie.
Do you imagine in luck? Do you suppose you’re a fortunate individual?
Elif Aktug
Completely. There’s quite a lot of fairy mud that has been sprinkled. No matter you need to name it, I imagine in it. It’s being in the fitting place on the proper time. It additionally feels good to imagine in it. It takes away any concept that you simply’re controlling something. However not dangerous luck, solely good luck!
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