Nicole Mary Kidman, (born 20 June 1967) is an Australian and American actress and producer. She is the recipient of multiple awards, including an Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, five Golden Globe Awards, and the Silver Bear for Best Actress.
Kidman began her acting career in Australia with the 1983 film Bush Christmas. Her breakthrough came in 1989 with the thriller Dead Calm and the television miniseries Bangkok Hilton. In 1990, she made her Hollywood debut in the racing film Days of Thunder, opposite Tom Cruise. She went on to achieve wide recognition with leading roles in the romantic drama Far and Away (1992), the superhero film Batman Forever (1995), the crime comedy-drama To Die For (1995), for which she won a Golden Globe Award, and the erotic thriller Eyes Wide Shut (1999). She received two consecutive Academy Award for Best Actress nominations for playing a courtesan in the musical Moulin Rouge! (2001) and the writer Virginia Woolf in the drama film The Hours (2002); she won the award for the latter, and received Golden Globes for both films.
Kidman continued to star in commercially successful films, including the horror-thriller The Others (2001) and the epic war drama film Cold Mountain (2003), as she achieved critical acclaim for roles in independent films, including the dramas Dogville (2003), Birth (2004), Rabbit Hole (2010), for which she received a third Best Actress Oscar nomination, and the thriller The Paperboy (2012). Following a period of critical and commercial failures, Kidman earned a fourth Oscar nomination for playing a troubled mother in the biopic Lion (2016). She returned to television in 2017 with an acclaimed performance as a victim of domestic abuse in the HBO series Big Little Lies, for which she won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series.
Kidman has been a Goodwill ambassador for UNICEF since 1994 and for UNIFEM since 2006. In 2006, Kidman was made a Companion in the Order of Australia and was the highest-paid actress in the motion picture industry for that year. As a result of being born to Australian parents in Hawaii, Kidman has dual citizenship in Australia and the United States. Kidman founded and owns the production company Blossom Films. Following her divorce from actor Tom Cruise, Kidman has been married to singer Keith Urban since 2006.
Video Nicole Kidman
Early life
Kidman was born 20 June 1967 in Honolulu, Hawaii, while her Australian parents were temporarily in the United States on student visas. Her father was Antony Kidman (1938-2014), a biochemist, clinical psychologist and author, who died of a heart attack in Singapore aged 75. Her mother, Janelle Ann (née Glenny), is a nursing instructor who edited her husband's books and was a member of the Women's Electoral Lobby. Kidman's ancestry includes Irish, Scottish and English heritage.
Being born in Hawaii, she was given the Hawaiian name "H?k?lani". The inspiration for the name came from a baby elephant born around the same time at the Honolulu Zoo, but the name is also a commonly used Hawaiian name for girls, Hokulani meaning 'Heavenly Star'.
At the time of Kidman's birth, her father was a graduate student at the University of Hawai?i at M?noa. He became a visiting fellow at the National Institute of Mental Health of the United States. Opposed to the war in Vietnam, Kidman's parents participated in anti-war protests while living in Washington, D.C. The family returned to Australia when Kidman was four and her mother now lives on Sydney's North Shore. Kidman has a younger sister, Antonia Kidman, a journalist and TV presenter.
Kidman attended Lane Cove Public School and North Sydney Girls' High School. She was enrolled in ballet at three and showed her natural talent for acting in her primary and high school years. She says that she was first inspired to become an actress upon seeing Margaret Hamilton's performance as the Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz. Kidman has revealed that she was timid as a child, saying, "I am very shy - really shy - I even had a stutter as a kid, which I slowly got over, but I still regress into that shyness. So I don't like walking into a crowded restaurant by myself; I don't like going to a party by myself."
She initially studied at the Phillip Street Theatre in Sydney. At Philip Street, Kidman studied alongside Naomi Watts who had attended the same high school. She also attended the Australian Theatre for Young People. Here she took up drama, mime and performing in her teens, finding acting to be a refuge. Owing to her fair skin and naturally red hair, the Australian sun forced the young Kidman to rehearse in halls of the theatre. A regular at the Phillip Street Theatre, she received both encouragement and praise to pursue acting full-time.
Maps Nicole Kidman
Career
1983-1994: Career beginnings
In 1983, aged 16, Kidman made her film debut in a remake of the Australian holiday season favourite Bush Christmas. By the end of 1983, she had a supporting role in the television series Five Mile Creek. In 1984, her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, which caused Kidman to halt her acting work temporarily while she studied massage so she could help her mother with physical therapy. She began gaining popularity in the mid-1980s after appearing in several film roles, including BMX Bandits (1983), Watch the Shadows Dance (1987 aka Nightmaster), and the romantic comedy Windrider (1986), which earned Kidman attention due to her racy scenes. Also during the decade, she appeared in several Australian productions, including the soap opera A Country Practice and the miniseries Vietnam (1986). She also made guest appearances on Australian television programs and TV movies.
In 1988, Kidman appeared in Emerald City, based on the play of the same name. The Australian film earned her an Australian Film Institute for Best Supporting Actress. Kidman next starred with Sam Neill in Dead Calm (1989) as Rae Ingram, playing the wife of a naval officer. The thriller brought Kidman to international recognition; Variety commented: "Throughout the film, Kidman is excellent. She gives the character of Rae real tenacity and energy." Meanwhile, critic Roger Ebert noted the excellent chemistry between the leads, stating, "Kidman and Zane do generate real, palpable hatred in their scenes together." She followed that up with the Australian miniseries Bangkok Hilton. She next moved on to star alongside her then-boyfriend and future husband, Tom Cruise, in the 1990 auto racing film Days of Thunder, as a young doctor who falls in love with a NASCAR driver. It is Kidman's American debut and was among the highest-grossing films of the year.
In 1991, she co-starred with Thandie Newton and former classmate Naomi Watts in the Australian independent film Flirting. They portrayed high school girls in this coming of age story, which won the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Film. That same year, her work in the film Billy Bathgate earned Kidman her first Golden Globe Award nomination, for Best Supporting Actress. The New York Times, in its film review, called her "a beauty with, it seems, a sense of humor". The following year, she and Cruise re-teamed for Ron Howard's Irish epic Far and Away (1992), which was a modest critical and commercial success. In 1993, she starred in the thriller Malice opposite Alec Baldwin and the drama My Life opposite Michael Keaton.
1995-2003: Worldwide recognition
In 1995, Kidman appeared in her highest-grossing live-action film (as of 2018), playing Dr. Chase Meridian, the damsel in distress, in the superhero film Batman Forever, opposite Val Kilmer as the film's title character. The same year Kidman starred in Gus Van Sant's critically acclaimed dark comedy To Die For, in which she played the murderous newcaster Suzanne Stone. Of Kidman's Golden Globe award-winning performance, Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle said "[she] brings to the role layers of meaning, intention and impulse. Telling her story in close-up - as she does throughout the film - Kidman lets you see the calculation, the wheels turning, the transparent efforts to charm that succeed in charming all the same." Kidman next appeared in The Portrait of a Lady (1996), based on the novel of the same name, alongside Barbara Hershey, John Malkovich, and Mary-Louise Parker. The following year, she starred in the action-thriller The Peacemaker (1997) as White House nuclear expert Dr. Julia Kelly, opposite George Clooney. The film grossed $110,000,000 worldwide. In 1998, she co-starred with Sandra Bullock in the poorly received fantasy Practical Magic as a modern-day witch. Kidman returned to her work on stage the same year in the David Hare play The Blue Room, which opened in London.
In 1999, Kidman reunited with then husband, Tom Cruise, to portray a married couple in Eyes Wide Shut, the final film of director Stanley Kubrick. The film was subject to censorship controversies due to the explicit nature of its sex scenes. The film received further attention following Kubrick's death shortly before its release. After brief hiatus and a highly publicized divorce from Cruise, Kidman returned to the screen to play a mail-order bride in the British-American drama Birthday Girl. In 2001, Kidman played the cabaret actress and courtesan Satine in Baz Luhrmann's musical Moulin Rouge!, opposite Ewan McGregor. Her performance and her singing received positive reviews; Paul Clinton of CNN.com called it her best work since To Die For, and wrote "[she] is smoldering and stunning as Satine. She moves with total confidence throughout the film [...] Kidman seems to specialize in "ice queen" characters, but with Satine she allows herself to thaw, just a bit." Subsequently, Kidman received her second Golden Globe Award, for Best Actress in a Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, as well as many other acting awards and nominations. She also received her first Academy Award nomination, for Best Actress.
Also in 2001, she had a starring role in Alejandro Amenábar's horror film The Others as Grace Stewart, a mother living in the Channel Islands during World War II who suspects her house is haunted. Grossing over $210,947,037 worldwide, the film also earned several Goya Awards award nominations, including a Best Actress nomination for Kidman. She received her second BAFTA and fifth Golden Globe nominations. Roger Ebert commented that "Alejandro Amenábar has the patience to create a languorous, dreamy atmosphere, and Nicole Kidman succeeds in convincing us that she is a normal person in a disturbing situation and not just a standard-issue horror movie hysteric." Kidman was named the World's Most Beautiful Person by People magazine
In 2002, Kidman won critical praise for her portrayal of Virginia Woolf in Stephen Daldry's The Hours, which stars Meryl Streep and Julianne Moore. Kidman famously wore prosthetics that were applied to her nose making her almost unrecognisable playing the author during her time in 1920s England, and her bouts with depression and mental illness while trying to write her novel, Mrs. Dalloway. The film earned positive notices and several nominations, including for an Academy Award for Best Picture. The New York Times wrote that, "Ms. Kidman, in a performance of astounding bravery, evokes the savage inner war waged by a brilliant mind against a system of faulty wiring that transmits a searing, crazy static into her brain". Kidman won numerous critics' awards, including her first BAFTA, third Golden Globe, and the Academy Award for Best Actress. As the first Australian actress to win an Academy Award, Kidman made a teary acceptance speech about the importance of art, even during times of war, saying, "Why do you come to the Academy Awards when the world is in such turmoil? Because art is important. And because you believe in what you do and you want to honour that, and it is a tradition that needs to be upheld."
Following her Oscar win, Kidman appeared in three very different films in 2003. The first, a leading role in Dogville, by Danish director Lars von Trier, was an experimental film set on a bare soundstage. Though the film divided critics in the United States, Kidman still earned praise for her performance. Peter Travers of Rolling Stones magazine stated "Kidman gives the most emotionally bruising performance of her career in Dogville, a movie that never met a cliche it didn't stomp on." The second was an adaptation of Philip Roth's novel The Human Stain, opposite Anthony Hopkins. Her third film was Anthony Minghella's war drama Cold Mountain. Kidman appeared opposite Jude Law and Renée Zellweger, playing Southerner Ada Monroe, who is in love with Law's character and separated by the Civil War. TIME magazine wrote, "Kidman takes strength from Ada's plight and grows steadily, literally luminous. Her sculptural pallor gives way to warm radiance in the firelight". The film garnered several award nominations and wins for its actors; Kidman received her sixth Golden Globe nomination at the 61st Golden Globe Awards for Best Actress.
2004-2009: Continued success
In 2004 she appeared in the film Birth, which received controversy over a scene in which Kidman shares a bath with her co-star, 10-year-old Cameron Bright. At a press conference at the Venice Film Festival, Kidman addressed the controversy saying, "It wasn't that I wanted to make a film where I kiss a 10-year-old boy. I wanted to make a film where you understand love". Kidman earned her seventh Golden Globe nomination, for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama. That same year she appeared in the black comedy-science-fiction film The Stepford Wives, a remake of the 1975 film of the same name. Kidman appeared in the lead role as Joanna Eberhart, a successful producer. The film, directed by Frank Oz, was critically panned and a commercial failure. The following year, Kidman appeared opposite Sean Penn in the Sydney Pollack thriller The Interpreter, playing UN translator Silvia Broome. Also that year, she starred in Bewitched, based on the 1960s TV sitcom of the same name, opposite Will Ferrell. Both Kidman and Ferrell earned that year's Razzie Award for "Worst Screen Couple". Neither film fared well in the United States, with box office sales falling well short of the production costs, but both films performed well internationally.
In conjunction with her success in the film industry, Kidman became the face of the Chanel No. 5 perfume brand. She starred in a campaign of television and print ads with Rodrigo Santoro, directed by Moulin Rouge! director Baz Luhrmann, to promote the fragrance during the holiday seasons of 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2008. The three-minute commercial produced for Chanel No. 5 made Kidman the record holder for the most money paid per minute to an actor after she reportedly earned US$12million for the three-minute advert. During this time, Kidman was also listed as the 45th Most Powerful Celebrity on the 2005 Forbes Celebrity 100 List. She made a reported US$14.5 million in 2004-2005. On People magazine's list of 2005's highest-paid actresses, Kidman was second behind Julia Roberts, with US$16-17 million per-film price tag. Nintendo in 2007 announced that Kidman would be the new face of Nintendo's advertising campaign for the Nintendo DS game More Brain Training in its European market.
Kidman portrayed photographer Diane Arbus in the biography Fur (2006), opposite Robert Downey, Jr.. Both Kidman and Downey Jr. received praise for their performances. She also lent her voice to the animated film Happy Feet (2006), which grossed over US$384 million worldwide. In 2007, she starred in the science-fiction movie The Invasion directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, a remake of the 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers that proved a critical and commercial failure. She also played opposite Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jack Black in Noah Baumbach's comedy-drama Margot at the Wedding, which earned Kidman a Satellite Award nomination for Best Actress - Musical or Comedy. She then starred in the fantasy-adventure, The Golden Compass (2007), playing the villainous Marisa Coulter.
In 2008, she reunited with Moulin Rouge! director Baz Luhrmann in the Australian period film Australia, set in the remote Northern Territory during the Japanese attack on Darwin during World War II. Kidman played opposite Hugh Jackman as an Englishwoman feeling overwhelmed by the continent. The acting was praised and the movie was a box office success worldwide. Kidman was originally set to star in the post-World War II German drama, The Reader, working with previous collaborators Sydney Pollack and Anthony Minghella, but due to her pregnancy prior to filming she had to back out. The role went to Kate Winslet, who ultimately won the Oscar for Best Actress, which Kidman presented to her during the 81st Academy Awards. Kidman appeared in the 2009 Rob Marshall musical Nine, portraying the Federico Fellini-like character's muse, Claudia Jenssen. She was featured alongside fellow Oscar winners Daniel Day-Lewis, Judi Dench, Marion Cotillard, Penélope Cruz and Sophia Loren. Kidman, whose screen time was brief compared to the other actresses, performed the musical number "Unusual Way" alongside Day-Lewis. The film received several Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations, and earned Kidman a fourth Screen Actors Guild Award nomination, as part of the Outstanding Cast.
2010-2015: Independent films and biopics
In 2010, Kidman starred with Aaron Eckhart in the film adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Rabbit Hole, for which she vacated her role in the Woody Allen picture You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger. Her work on Rabbit Hole earned her critical acclaim, and received nominations for the Academy Awards, Golden Globe Awards, and Screen Actors Guild Awards, Kidman also produced this film. She lent her voice to a promotional video that Australia used to support its bid to host the 2018 FIFA World Cup. TV Guide reported in 2008 that Kidman will star in The Danish Girl, a film adaptation of the novel of the same name, playing Lili Elbe, the world's first postoperative transsexual. Screen Daily reported that shooting would begin in Germany in July 2011. However the project has been delayed following the exit of the director, Lasse Hallström and Kidman's co-star Rachel Weisz. In 2009, Variety said that she would produce and star in a film adaptation of the Chris Cleave novel Little Bee, in association with BBC Films.
In June 2010, TV Guide announced that Kidman and Clive Owen will star in an HBO film about Ernest Hemingway and his relationship with Martha Gellhorn. entitled Hemingway & Gellhorn. The film, directed by Philip Kaufman, began shooting in March 2011, with an air date scheduled for 2012. She also starred alongside Nicolas Cage in director Joel Schumacher's action-thriller Trespass, with the stars playing a married couple taken hostage. On 17 September 2010, ContactMusic. com said Kidman would return to Broadway to portray Alexandra Del Lago in David Cromer's revival of Tennessee Williams' Sweet Bird of Youth, with Scott Rudin producing. On 30 August 2011, Cromer spoke to The New York Times and explained that the production would not meet its original fall 2011 revival date but that it remains an active project.
In June 2011, Kidman was cast in Lee Daniels' adaptation of the Pete Dexter novel, The Paperboy; she began filming on the thriller on 1 August 2011, and The Paperboy was released in 2012. In the film, she portrayed death row groupie Charlotte Bless, and performed sex scenes that she claims not to have remembered until seeing the finished film. "I was like okay, so that's what I did," she said. The film competed in the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, and Kidman's performance drew critical acclaim and among nominations for the SAG and the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress, gave Kidman her second Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress and her tenth nomination overall. In 2012, Kidman's audiobook recording of Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse was released at Audible.com. Kidman also co-starred in Park Chan-wook's Stoker (2013) to positive critical response and a Saturn Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. In April 2013 she was selected as a member of the main competition jury at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival.
In 2014, Kidman starred in the biopic, Grace of Monaco in the title role that chronicles the 1962 crisis, in which Charles de Gaulle blockaded the tiny principality, angered by Monaco's status as a tax haven for wealthy French subjects and Kelly's contemplating a Hollywood return to star in Alfred Hitchcock's Marnie. Opening out of competition at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival, the film received largely negative reviews. Kidman also starred in two films with Colin Firth, the first, the British-Australian historical drama, The Railway Man in which Kidman played officer's wife Patti Lomax received positive critical reviews. Katherine Monk of the Montreal Gazette said of Kidman's performance, "It's a truly masterful piece of acting that transcends Teplitzky's store-bought framing, but it's Kidman who delivers the biggest surprise: For the first time since her eyebrows turned into solid marble arches, the Australian Oscar winner is truly terrific". The second, the British thriller film Before I Go To Sleep drew positive critical response of Kidman's performance, as Christine Lucas, a car crash survivor with brain damage. Kidman also appeared in the family film Paddington (2014) as a villain.
On 23 January, she starred in the Australian-Irish drama-thriller Strangerland, which opened at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival to a "rapturous" audience response to Kidman's performance. Kidman also co-starred in the Jason Bateman-directed The Family Fang, produced by Kidman's production company, Blossom Films, which premiered at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival. Other projects include the biographical drama Queen of the Desert, with Kidman portraying the lead role of traveller, writer, archaeologist, explorer, cartographer and political officer Gertrude Bell and Genius alongside Colin Firth and Guy Pearce. Kidman played a lead role in the 2015 thriller Secret in Their Eyes, directed by Billy Ray and co-starring Julia Roberts and Chiwetel Ejiofor. After more than 15 years, Kidman returned to the West End in the UK premiere of Photograph 51 at the Noël Coward Theatre. She starred as British scientist Rosalind Franklin in the production from 5 September to 21 November 2015, directed by Michael Grandage. The play focuses on Franklin's role in the discovery of the structure of DNA. Kidman and the play earned "glowing reviews." Her return to the West End has been hailed a success, especially after having won an acting award for her role in Photograph 51.
2016-present: Resurgence
In 2016, Kidman's performance in Lion earned rave reviews, as well as nominations for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, her fourth nomination overall, the Critics Choice for Best Supporting Actress, the Screen Actors Guild for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role, the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role, a win in the same category at the Hollywood Film Awards as well as her third Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress, and her eleventh nomination overall. Kidman portrayed Sue Brierly, the adoptive mother of Saroo, an Indian boy who was separated from his birth family, a role she felt connected to as she herself is the mother of adopted children. Richard Roeper of The Chicago Sun-Times felt that "Kidman gives a powerful and moving performance as Saroo's adoptive mother, who loves her son with every molecule of her being but comes to understand his quest. It's as good as anything she's done in the last decade."
In 2017, Kidman returned to television in the seven-part miniseries adaptation of the Liane Moriarty bestseller Big Little Lies, which premiered on HBO. She produced the miniseries along with her co-star, Reese Witherspoon, and the show's director, Jean-Marc Vallée. She plays Celeste Wright, a former lawyer and housewife, who is concealing her abusive relationship with her younger husband, played by Alexander Skarsgård. Kidman has garnered critical acclaim for her performance, with Matthew Jacobs of The Huffington Post stating that she "delivered a career-defining performance." Ann Hornaday of The Washington Post wrote that "Kidman belongs in the pantheon of great actresses." She has received a nomination from the Television Critics Association and won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or Movie for her performance, as well as winning the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series as a producer. She went on to win a Golden Globe and SAG Award for her role.
She then played Martha Farnsworth, the headmistress of an all-girls school during the Civil War, in Sofia Coppola's drama The Beguiled, an adaptation of the novel written by Thomas P. Cullinan, which premiered at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival, competing for the Palme d'Or. The film received positive reviews, as did Kidman's performance, with Katie Walsh of Tribune News Service noting "Nicole Kidman is particularly, unsurprisingly excellent in her performance as the steely Miss Martha. She is controlled and in control, unflappable. Her genteel manners and femininity coexist easily with her toughness." Kidman had two other films premiere at the festival, the science-fiction romantic comedy How to Talk to Girls at Parties, reuniting her with director John Cameron Mitchell, and the psychological thriller The Killing of a Sacred Deer, directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, which also competed for the Palme d'Or. Also in 2017, Kidman played a supporting role in the television series Top of the Lake: China Girl.
Upcoming projects
Kidman is set to portray Queen Atlanna, the mother of the title character, in the Warner Bros. film Aquaman. She will also star alongside Bryan Cranston and Kevin Hart in The Upside, a re-make of the 2011 French comedy The Intouchables. She is also set to star in the upcoming animated film, The Guardian Brothers, alongside Meryl Streep, Mel Brooks, Edward Norton, and Dan Fogler. She will be guest starring in the fifth season of the VH1 action crime television series Hopeless Fountain Kingdom, with Michael Fassbender and Bryce Dallas Howard.
Personal life
Relationships and children
Kidman has been married twice: previously to actor Tom Cruise, and currently to country singer Keith Urban. She has an adopted son and daughter with Cruise as well as two biological daughters with Urban. Kidman met Cruise in November 1989, while filming Days of Thunder, they were married on Christmas Eve 1990 in Telluride, Colorado. The couple adopted a daughter, Isabella Jane (born 1992), and a son, Connor Anthony (born 1995). On 5 February 2001, the couple's spokesperson announced their separation. Cruise filed for divorce two days later, and the marriage was dissolved in August of that year, with Cruise citing irreconcilable differences. In a 2007 interview with Marie Claire, Kidman noted the incorrect reporting of the ectopic pregnancy early in her marriage. "It was wrongly reported as miscarriage, by everyone who picked up the story." "So it's huge news, and it didn't happen."
In the June 2006 issue of Ladies' Home Journal, she said she still loved Cruise: "He was huge; still is. To me, he was just Tom, but to everybody else, he is huge. But he was lovely to me and I loved him. I still love him." In addition, she has expressed shock about their divorce. In 2015, former Church of Scientology executive Mark Rathbun claimed in a documentary film that he was instructed to "facilitate [Cruise's] breakup with Nicole Kidman". Cruise's auditor further claimed Kidman had been wiretapped on Cruise's suggestion.
Prior to marrying Cruise, Kidman had been involved in relationships with Australian actor Marcus Graham and Windrider (1986) co-star Tom Burlinson. She was also said to be involved with Adrien Brody. The film Cold Mountain brought rumours that an affair between Kidman and co-star Jude Law was responsible for the break-up of his marriage. Both denied the allegations, and Kidman won an undisclosed sum from the British tabloids that published the story. She met musician Lenny Kravitz in 2003 and dated him into 2004. Robbie Williams confirmed he had a short romance with Kidman on her yacht in summer 2004.
In a 2007 Vanity Fair interview, Kidman revealed that she had been secretly engaged to someone prior to her present relationship to New Zealand-Australian country singer Keith Urban, whom she met at G'Day LA, an event honouring Australians, in January 2005. Kidman married Urban on 25 June 2006, at Cardinal Cerretti Memorial Chapel in the grounds of St Patrick's Estate, Manly in Sydney. In an interview in 2015, Kidman said, "We didn't really know each other - we got to know each other during our marriage." They maintain homes in Sydney, Sutton Forest (New South Wales, Australia), Los Angeles, and Nashville (Tennessee, USA). The couple's first daughter was born in 2008, in Nashville. In 2010, Kidman and Urban had their second daughter via surrogacy at Nashville's Centennial Women's Hospital.
In an on-stage interview by Tina Brown at the 2015 Women in the World (WITW) conference, Kidman stated that she turned her attention to her career after her divorce from Tom Cruise: "Out of my divorce came work that was applauded so that was an interesting thing for me", and led to her Academy Award in 2002.
Religious and political views
Kidman is Catholic. She attended Mary Mackillop Chapel in North Sydney. Following criticism of The Golden Compass by Catholic leaders as anti-Catholic, Kidman told Entertainment Weekly that the Catholic Church is part of her "essence," and that her religious beliefs would prevent her from taking a role in a film she perceived as anti-Catholic. During her divorce from Tom Cruise, she stated that she did not want their children raised as Scientologists. She has been reluctant to discuss Scientology since her divorce. In 2014, Kidman said she had been practicing Transcendental Meditation since her early twenties. Kidman has donated to U.S. Democratic party candidates.
Wealth, philanthropy and honours
In 2002, Kidman first appeared on the Australian rich list published annually in the Business Review Weekly with an estimated net worth of A$122 million. In the 2011 published list, Kidman's wealth was estimated at A$304 million, down from A$329 million in 2010. Kidman has raised money for, and drawn attention to, disadvantaged children around the world. In 1994, she was appointed a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF, and in 2004, she was honoured as a "Citizen of the World" by the United Nations. Kidman joined the Little Tee Campaign for breast cancer care to design T-shirts or vests to raise money to fight the disease; motivated by her mother's own battle with breast cancer in 1984.
In the 2006 Australia Day Honours, Kidman was made a Companion of Order of Australia (AC) for "service to the performing arts as an acclaimed motion picture performer, to health care through contributions to improve medical treatment for women and children and advocacy for cancer research, to youth as a principal supporter of young performing artists, and to humanitarian causes in Australia and internationally." However, due to film commitments and her wedding to Urban, it wasn't until 13 April 2007 that she was presented with the honour. It was presented by the Governor-General of Australia, Major General Michael Jeffery, in a ceremony at Government House, Canberra. Kidman was appointed goodwill ambassador of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) in 2006. In this capacity, Kidman has addressed international audiences at UN events, raised awareness through the media and testified before the United States House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs to support the International Violence against Women Act. Kidman visited Kosovo in 2006 to learn about women's experiences of conflict and UNIFEM's support efforts. She is the international spokesperson for UNIFEM's Say NO - UNiTE to End Violence against Women initiative. Kidman and the UNIFEM executive director presented over five million signatures collected during the first phase of this to the UN Secretary-General on 25 November 2008.
In the beginning of 2009, Kidman appeared in a series of postage stamps featuring Australian actors. She, Geoffrey Rush, Russell Crowe, and Cate Blanchett each appear twice in the series: once as themselves and once as their Academy Award-nominated character, Kidman's second stamp showed her as Satine from Moulin Rouge!. On 8 January 2010, alongside Nancy Pelosi, Joan Chen and Joe Torre, Kidman attended the ceremony to help Family Violence Prevention Fund break ground on a new international center located in the Presidio of San Francisco.
In 2015, Kidman became the brand ambassador for Etihad Airways.
Kidman supports the Nashville Predators, being seen and photographed almost nightly throughout the season. Additionally, she supports Sydney Swans in the Australian Football League, and once served as a club ambassador.
Filmography
As of 2017, Kidman's movies have grossed more than US$3.9 billion at the worldwide box-office according to Box Office Mojo.
Discography
Her discography consists of one spoken word album, one extended play, three singles, three music videos, ten other appearances, a number of unreleased tracks and two tribute songs recorded by various artists. Kidman, primarily known in the field of acting, entered the music industry in the 2000s after recording a number of tracks for the soundtrack album to Baz Luhrmann's 2001 motion picture Moulin Rouge! that she starred. Her duet with Ewan McGregor entitled "Come What May" was released as her debut and the second single of the OST through Interscope on 24 September 2001. The composition became the eighth highest selling single by an Australian artist for that year, being certified Gold by Australian Recording Industry Association, while reaching on the UK Singles Chart at number twenty-seven. In addition to, the song received a nomination at the 59th Golden Globe Awards as the Best Original Song and has been listed as the eighty-fifth within AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs by American Film Institute.
"Somethin' Stupid", a cover version of Frank and Nancy Sinatra followed soon. The track recorded as her common duet with English singer-songwriter Robbie Williams was issued on 14 December 2001, by Chrysalis as the lead of his fourth studio album Swing When You're Winning. Kidman's second single topped the official music charts in Italy, New Zealand, Portugal and England, as well as scored top ten placings all over Europe, including Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland. Apart from being certified either Gold or Silver in a number of countries, it was classified as the eleventh best-selling single of 2002 in Italy, thirtieth in the UK, the fifty-ninth in Australia, and the ninety-third in France, respectively.
On 5 April 2002, Kidman released through Interscope her third single, a cover of Randy Crawford's "One Day I'll Fly Away". A Tony Philips remix of the track was promoted as the pilot single of a follow-up to the original soundtrack of the same name, Moulin Rouge! Vol. 2. After that, in 2006, she contributed with her vocal for the OST Happy Feet on a rendition of Prince' "Kiss". While in 2009, she was featured on the Nine soundtrack ("Unusual Way").
Most recently, her name has been credited on a track called "What's the Procedure", issued on 14 March 2013, on the compilation I Know Why They Call It Pop: Volume 2 by Rok Lok Records. Among others, Kidman also narrated an audiobook in 2012.
Her collaboration with Ewan McGregor on "Come What May" peaked at No. 27 in the UK Singles Chart. Later she collaborated with Robbie Williams on "Somethin' Stupid", a cover version for Williams' swing covers album Swing When You're Winning; the song peaked at No. 8 in the Australian ARIAnet Singles Chart and at No. 1, for three weeks, in the UK. In 2006, while voicing a role in the animated movie Happy Feet, she provided vocals for Norma Jean's "heartsong", a slightly altered version of "Kiss" by Prince. Kidman sang in Rob Marshall's movie musical Nine (2009).
In 2017, she and Nicolle Gaylon sung backing vocals on her husband, country music singer Keith Urban's song 'Female'.
Awards
In 2003, Kidman received a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In addition to her 2003 Academy Award for Best Actress, Kidman has received Best Actress awards from the following critics' groups or award-granting organisations: the Hollywood Foreign Press (Golden Globes), the Australian Film Institute, Blockbuster Entertainment Awards, Empire Awards, Golden Satellite Awards, Hollywood Film Festival, London Critics Circle, Russian Guild of Film Critics, and the Southeastern Film Critics Association. In 2003, Kidman was given the American Cinematheque Award. She also received recognition from the National Association of Theatre Owners at the ShoWest Convention in 1992 as the Female Star of Tomorrow and in 2002 for a Distinguished Decade of Achievement in Film.
References
Further reading
- Dickerson, James (2003). Nicole Kidman. Citadel. ISBN 978-0-8065-2490-0.
- Thomson, David (2006). Nicole Kidman. Knopf. ISBN 978-1-4000-4273-9.
- Tylski, Alexandre (2016). Nicole Kidman. Phaidon. ISBN 978-0714868035.
External links
- Nicole Kidman at Encyclopædia Britannica
- Nicole Kidman on IMDb
- Nicole Kidman at the TCM Movie Database
- Nicole Kidman at the Internet Broadway Database
- Nicole Kidman at Curlie (based on DMOZ)
- Nicole Kidman at Box Office Mojo
- Nicole Kidman at AllMovie
- Nicole Kidman at People.com
- Nicole Kidman's charity work
- Works by or about Nicole Kidman in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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