Her face seems ever more frozen, but Nicole Kidman’s inhibitions are melting.
At the age of 57, the actress who made her name in 1989 jail drama Bangkok Hilton, is suddenly taking no prisoners.
From diva disses on the red carpet to some ego fueled La La Land introspection, it’s all adding up to some increasingly bizarre behavior.
Take this musing on hubby Keith Urban and her apparent emotional sensitivity during a CBS News Sunday Morning interview earlier this month: ‘Keith always says to me that I’m like a raw egg and he has to be my shell.’
On recent form, I’d say she’s more hard boiled.
At last week’s LA premiere of the erotic thriller Babygirl, in which Kidman’s takes a knee-trembling turn as a cougar CEO, the former red head made a passive aggressive swipe at a publication apparently deemed unworthy of her platitudes.
Her face seems ever more frozen, but Nicole Kidman ‘s inhibitions are melting. At the age of 57, the actress who made her name in 1989 jail drama ‘Bangkok Hilton,’ is suddenly taking no prisoners. (Pictured: Nicole Kidman in Sydney on December 22, 2024)
At last week’s LA premiere of the erotic thriller ‘Babygirl,’ in which Kidman’s takes a knee-trembling turn as a cougar CEO, the former red head made a passive aggressive swipe at a publication apparently deemed unworthy of her platitudes. (Pictured: Scene from ‘BabyGirl’)
‘Pop Crave?’ she queried, faced with a reporter from the popular showbiz site. A smirk and shoulder shrug to some minion off camera followed just in case there was any doubt that this gossipy puff was beneath her, even if it was feeding her publicity machine.
Perhaps it’s that some four decades into her film career, Kidman is selling herself… on her own terms.
Here’s how she described her brave battle with on-set exhaustion while filming Babygirl as she gamely persevered through sex scenes with her 28-year-old co-star Harris Dickinson.
‘There were times when we were shooting where I was like, ‘I don’t want to orgasm anymore,’ she said of that age-old occupational hazard in an interview with The Sun.
‘It was so present all the time for me that it was almost like a burnout,’ Kidman lamented. This is clearly a woman who suffers for her art.
And that’s not the only surprising sauciness on show in recent months.
Who can forget that attention grabbing jostle with actress and producer Salma Hayek at Balenciaga’s Spring 2025 show during Paris Fashion Week in September?
Kidman appeared to bat away the Frida star’s attempt to pose together for photos. The suspected snub had all the hallmark of Hollywood diva one upmanship heightened, perhaps, by some luxe label anxiety.
Who can forget that attention grabbing jostle with actress and producer Salma Hayek at Balenciaga’s Spring 2025 show during Paris Fashion Week in September? (Pictured: Kidman and Hayek on September 30, 2024)
Kidman appeared to bat away the Frida star’s attempt to pose together for photos.
Hayek is married to the CEO of Balenciaga’s parent company while Kidman is a lowly brand ambassador for the fashion house. (Pictured: Francois-Henri Pinault and his wife Salma Hayek at Balenciaga RTW Spring 2025 as part of Paris Fashion Week on September 30, 2024)
You see, Hayek is married to the CEO of Balenciaga’s parent company while Kidman is a lowly brand ambassador for the fashion house. Kidman may be a vocal proponent of female filmmakers, but Hayek is one person she won’t be taking direction from.
It’s all a departure from the days when her appearances at a premiere involved no more than glacial gliding and a fixed smile.
Happy to flash the flesh on film, off screen Kidman has always seemed more buttoned up especially when better known as Mrs Tom Cruise, content to pose more like his ‘plus one’ than appearing as a bona fide star in her own right.
Marshalled around the red carpet by her pint-sized ex, the actress was just shy smiles, and chaste waves save for the on-cue displays of insipid PDA nuzzling that seemed to follow Cruise’s whispered instructions.
Even at her own premiere of the thriller Malice in 1993 it was all about Tom.
‘Have you seen it, Tom? What do you think of your lovely wife?’ asked a reporter as a gauche Kidman giggled and all attention turned to the master’s verdict standing next to her.
Other times she was less convincing looking tight-lipped and plain bored as Tom basked in the attention promoting A Few Good Men as a reporter asked him if it was difficult ‘leaving her at home’ while he was away filming….
With a talent arguably more versatile than her franchise-loving ex, no wonder the Stepford wife routine was always going to be short-lived for Kidman.
Her infamous post-divorce dig hinted at some bite below the surface. ‘Well, I can wear heels now,’ she joked during a 2001 episode of Late Night with David Letterman when the host asked her about the split.
Marshalled around the red carpet by her pint-sized ex, the actress was just shy smiles, and chaste waves save for the on-cue displays of insipid PDA nuzzling that seemed to follow Cruise’s whispered instructions. (Pictured: Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise at the premiere of ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ in Westwood, California in July 1999.)
Happy to flash the flesh on film, off screen Kidman has always seemed more buttoned up especially when better known as Mrs Tom Cruise, content to pose more like his ‘plus one’ than appearing as a bona fide star in her own right. (Pictured: Scene from ‘Eyes Wide Shut’)
So, it’s no big surprise the Aussie native is now cutting loose – again. For a start, this is a turning point in both her personal and professional life. The recent death of her beloved mother, Janelle, in September, will have had an effect.
Kidman once described her as mom as her ‘mentor… guide and… nurturer’ in a 2020 interview. ‘She’s given me the fire to pursue the career I have because I’ve always wanted to please her,’ said Kidman. ‘Mum didn’t necessarily get the career that she wanted, but she was determined that her daughters would have opportunities…’
Perhaps now without the judgment and grounding influence of her parents – her father Antony died in 2014 – she’s even less of a good girl and a little more prone to displays of diva entitlement and indulgence.
Maybe, it’s that she’s realized life is simply too short for tact and diplomacy.
‘Time, as you get older, becomes the most precious thing,’ she told CBS News Sunday Morning’s fawning special correspondent Tracey Smith.
Of a vintage where she could have been consigned to Hollywood’s post-50 pastures, Kidman is in demand and still calling the shots, feted by industry players including Meryl Streep, who issued a nauseating syrupy tribute at the 49th American Film Institute Life Achievement Award.
‘You’re like a Mustang, a workhorse, a champion racer all in one whose spirit they’ll never break. Never break,’ said Streep, ever the performer.
Then there’s the Emmy-winning turn in the TV series Big Little Lies and The Perfect Couple.
Of a vintage where she could have been consigned to Hollywood’s post-50 pastures, Kidman is in demand and still calling the shots, feted by industry players including Meryl Streep, who issued a nauseating syrupy tribute at the 49th American Film Institute Life Achievement Award.
Kidman is reveling in a career high, garnering renewed commercial and critical success with a forte in playing brittle, botoxed beauties.
Is it any wonder if she is believing the hype?
Some might think we’ve reached peak Kidman – but not, it seems, Nicole herself.
Nearing the big 6-0, while delivering the big O on screen, she’s breaking both professional and industry ground and it would seem, everyone has to know about it.
Yet does she have the right to be quite so pleased with herself and be so imperious? As an erotic thriller rooted in an older woman’s sexual currency, Babygirl will seem a progressive antidote to, say, Basic Instinct’s classic male fantasy but does that make it any less crass or objectifying?
Isn’t it just more high gloss kink milking the cash cow sparked by the 50 Shades of Grey hype a decade ago?
Not that many will care. It chimes with an edgier zeitgeist and sets up Kidman nicely for a third act in her career as patron saint of female sexual empowerment with an eye on her legacy.
More plaudits will no doubt come her way, but does it all have to be at the expense of a little humility?
