Nicole Kidman is an Australian actress and producer.
Her full name is Nicole Mary Kidman.
She was born on June 20, 1967 in Honolulu, Hawaii, while her Australian parents were temporarily in the United States on student visas.
Her father, Antony Kidman, was a biochemist, clinical psychologist and author while her mother, Janelle Ann (née Glenny), was a nursing instructor who edited her husband’s books.
She has a younger sister, Antonia Kidman, a journalist and TV presenter.
Kidman’s ancestry includes Irish, Scottish and English heritage.
Being born in Hawaii, she was given the Hawaiian name “Hōkūlani”. 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’.
She was raised in Sydney and launched her acting career as a teenager.
In 1983, aged 16, Kidman made her film debut in a remake of the Australian holiday season favourite Bush Christmas.
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.
Kidman appeared as a schoolgirl-turned-protester in the miniseries Vietnam (1987) for which she won her first Australian Film Institute Award.
In 1988, Kidman appeared in film 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 the thriller Dead Calm (1989) as Rae Ingram, playing the wife of a naval officer.
She than starred 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.
She appeared as a catty high school senior in the Australian film Flirting (1991), then as Dustin Hoffman’s moll in the gangster flick Billy Bathgate (1991).
In 1993, she starred in the thriller Malice opposite Alec Baldwin and the drama My Life opposite Michael Keaton.
In 1995, Kidman appeared as Dr. Chase Meridian, the damsel in distress, in the superhero film Batman Forever, opposite Val Kilmer as the film’s title character.
Also in 1995, Kidman starred in Gus Van Sant’s critically acclaimed dark comedy To Die For, in which she played the murderous newcaster Suzanne Stone. She took home a Golden Globe and several critics’ awards for the performance.
In 1996, Kidman stepped into a corset to work with her countrywoman and onetime admirer, Jane Campion, on the adaptation of Henry James’s The Portrait of a Lady.
In 1997, she tore across the screen as a nuclear weapons expert in The Peacemaker, adding “action star” to her professional repertoire.
She than co-starred with Sandra Bullock in the poorly received fantasy Practical Magic (1998) as a modern-day witch.
In 1998, Kidman made her stage debut in London, playing five different roles in Sir David Hare’s The Blue Room, a well-received series of vignettes based on Arthur Schnitzler’s La Ronde.
In early 1999 she transferred with the play to New York City for her Broadway debut.
Also 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.
Kidman than played the cabaret actress and courtesan Satine in Baz Luhrmann’s musical Moulin Rouge! (2001), opposite Ewan McGregor. For her performance Kidman received 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.
In 2001 she also appeared in The Others, an atmospheric horror film, and the dark comedy Birthday Girl, in which she played a Russian mail-order bride.
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. She won numerous critics’ awards, including her first BAFTA, third Golden Globe, and the Academy Award for Best Actress.
A string of critical successes followed, including Dogville (2003), The Human Stain (2003) and Cold Mountain (2003).
Though more known for her dramatic work, Kidman has also tried her hand at comedy, starring in the remake of The Stepford Wives (2004), with Matthew Broderick and Bette Midler, and Bewitched (2005), with Will Ferrell. She also lent her voice to the lighthearted animated film Happy Feet (2006).
Kidman portrayed photographer Diane Arbus in the biography Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus (2006), opposite Robert Downey, Jr.. Both Kidman and Downey Jr. received praise for their performances
In 2007, she starred in the science-fiction movie The Invasion, the comedy-drama Margot at the Wedding and the fantasy-adventure, The Golden Compass.
She reteamed with with Moulin Rouge! director Baz Luhrmann for the romantic drama Australia (2008), playing a prim Englishwoman who arrives in Australia just after World War II to defend land she has inherited.
In 2010, Kidman portrayed a grieving mother in Rabbit Hole, a film adaptation of David Lindsay-Abaire’s acclaimed play. For her performance, she received nominations for the Academy Awards, Golden Globe Awards, and Screen Actors Guild Awards.
In 2011, she appeared in the romantic comedy Just Go with It and in the crime thriller Trespass.
In 2012 she starred as the writer Martha Gellhorn, who was briefly married to Ernest Hemingway, in the HBO movie Hemingway & Gellhorn, and she vamped as the fiancée of a death-row inmate in 1960s Florida in the pulp drama The Paperboy.
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 2013 Kidman starred opposite Colin Firth in The Railway Man, an adaptation of a memoir about a former soldier who is seeking the Japanese translator who tortured him while he was held captive during World War II.
Kidman teamed with Firth again in the thriller Before I Go to Sleep (2014), about a woman dealing with memory loss induced by a trauma.
In 2014, Kidman also starred in the biopic, Grace of Monaco and appeared in the family film Paddington as a villain.
In 2015, Kidman played a lead role in the thriller Secret in Their Eyes, directed by Billy Ray and co-starring Julia Roberts and Chiwetel Ejiofor.
In 2016, Kidman’s performance in Lion earned rave reviews, as well as many award nominations including the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and the Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
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.
Nicole Kidman is the recipient of a number of awards, including an Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, a BAFTA Award, three Golden Globe Awards, and the Silver Bear for Best Actress.
In the 2006 Australia Day Honours, Kidman was made a Companion of Order of Australia (AC).
Nicole Kidman has an estimated net worth of $130 million.
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 is the first Australian actress to win the Best Actress Academy Award.
Kidman received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California on January 13, 2003.
Kidman is in the 50th-anniversary edition of the Guinness Book Of Records as the highest-paid actress in a commercial. She netted $3.71 million for her part in a four-minute Baz Luhrmann-directed Chanel No. 5 movie ad. The ad, costing $11 million a minute, is a short film titled “No 5: The Film”. Guinness book editors noted the actress earned $928,800 per minute. Costumes designed by Karl Lagerfeld and score by Debussy.
For her role in Birthday Girl (2001) she went to the Russian Embassy in Australia for help in speaking Russian. She didn’t work with any other coach on the set except the woman from the embassy.
Although naturally left-handed, she taught herself to write right-handed for her role in The Hours (2002), where she played the right-handed author Virginia Woolf.
When she went to Sweden to shoot Dogvil (2003), it was the first time in 15 years that she had flown on a public plane.
A very tall woman at nearly 180 centimeters (5′ 11″), she actually stood about 10 centimeters (4 inches) taller than ex-husband Tom Cruise, and rarely wore heels when seen publicly with him so that they could appear similar in height. Since their divorce, she is rarely seen on the red carpet without high heels.
She is allergic to strawberries and scared of butterflies.
Her fans refers to themselves as “Kidmaniacs”.