Nicole Mary Kidman has become one of the biggest names in the industry ever since she put her foot in Hollywood waters. While audiences initially had a tough time accepting her as a leading lady, her breakthrough came with the thriller
Dead Calm (1989). Her versatility has always been a strong suit for her as it has allowed her to experiment with various genres including comedy, romance, thriller, and drama.
Her strong presence in films like
Moulin Rouge,
The Hours, To Die For, Birth,
Rabbit Hole, established her as an actress to be reckoned with in the industry. Apart from this, Kidman has also been heavily involved in the music industry as a singer. In keeping with her versatile choice of scripts, Kidman will be seen in Boy Erased (2018) which is a story about the horrors of gay conversion.
Early Life
Nicole was born on June 20, 1967, to Australian parents in Honolulu, Hawaii, USA, while they were temporarily in America on educational visas. As a result, she holds dual citizenship of both the countries.
Her father, Antony Kidman, was a biochemist, author and clinical psychologist, who passed away in 2014. Her mother, Janelle Ann, has been a member of Women`s Electoral Lobby and a nursing instructor. Her younger sister, Antonia Kidman, is a TV presenter and journalist.
Nicole did her schooling from the Lane Cove Public School and North Sydney Girl`s High School and completed her higher education from the Victorian College of Arts, Melbourne. After realizing that she wants to make it big in the world of glamor, Kidman honed her acting skills by attending the Australian Theatre for Young People the Phillip Street Theatre (Sydney).
Personal Life
Nicloe Kidman and
Tom Cruise instantly hit it off when they met while shooting for their movie Days of Thunder in 1989. The two got married in 1990 and have two adopted kids - a daughter named Isabella Jane (1992 born) and a son named Connor Anthony (born 1995). They had a decade long relationship before calling off their marriage in 2001.
She married country singer Keith Urban (from Australia-New Zealand) in 2006, and had their first daughter named Sunday Rose Kidman Urban in 2008. The couple had another daughter via surrogacy, named Faith Margaret Kidman Urban,
Movie Career
Regarded as one of the most beautiful actresses in Hollywood, Nicole started her film journey with the Australian Christmas drama movie Bush Christmas in 1983. She appeared in few more Aussie movies like
BMX Bandits (1983), Windrider (1986),
Emerald City (1988), etc. She then made her Hollywood debut with her critically acclaimed performance in the psychological thriller
Dead Calm (1989), alongside
Sam Neill and
Billy Zane. Kidman made her Hollywood debut opposite one of the most loved American actors, Tom Cruise, in the movie Days of Thunder in 1990.
She earned her first Golden Globe Award nomination (in the Best Supporting Actress category) with Billy Bathgate (1991). Earlier that year, Kidman managed to work with one of her best friends and actress
Naomi Watts, in the Australian independent movie Flirting. The movie won the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Film. She sizzled again on-screen with Tom Cruise in the Irish epic Far and Away in 1992. The year 1995 witnessed Kidman star in her highest grosser superhero action movie `
Batman Forever`, opposite
Val Kilmer. The brilliant actress won her first Golden Globe award for her stellar performance as a murderous newscaster in the film
To Die For (1995). She then appeared alongside actress
Sandra Bullock in the 1998 American romantic comedy movie Practical Magic.
Kidman and Cruise`s on-screen chemistry raised its bar with the erotic thriller
Eyes Wide Shut in 1999. Her stunning portrayal of the character of a courtesan in the 2001 musical
Moulin Rouge! won Kidman her second Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical. For the same movie, she received her first Oscar nomination.
She went on to become the first Australian to win Oscar award for Best Actress with her dogged performance in the role of a writer for the 2002 drama flick
The Hours. Some of her other notable performances during the 2000s were in movies like
The Others (2001), epic war film
Cold Mountain (2003), alongside
Jude Law and Renee Zellweger,
Dogville (2003), thriller flick
The Interpreter (2005), and the Australian-American-British-Western film
Australia (2008). The last movie Australia turned out to be the third highest grossers among Australian film of all time (till 2015).
Besides being really good at drama roles, Nicole explored comic roles with movies like
The Stepford Wives (2004) and
BeWitched (2005). She did voice-over acting for the animated film
Happy Feet (2006). Nicole made an appearance as a gorgeous screen icon in the 2009 musical drama
Nine, alongside stars like Marion Cotillard,
Penelope Cruz, Daniel Day-Lewis, and
Kate Hudson. She won her third Oscar nomination (apart from Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award nominations) for a significant role in the drama film
Rabbit Hole (2010 release). Kidman received the Primetime Emmy nomination for her performance in the TV biopic Hemingway & Gellhorn, that released in 2012.
The actress elegantly portrayed the character of another real-life personality, actress
Grace Kelly, in the Emmy nominated biopic
Grace of Monaco, released in 2014. The Australian movie Strangerland the American epic biographical drama flick
Queen of the Desert alongside
James Franco,
Robert Pattinson, and
Damian Lewis, and the thriller remake
Secret in their Eyes alongside
Julia Roberts, were some of her notable movies that released in 2015. Her other releases includes
The Goldfinch (2019),
Bombshell (2020) and
The Prom (2020).