Nicole Kidman interview

HOLLYWOOD ROYALTY AND DEVOTED MUM 

NICOLE KIDMAN 

SPEAKS FROM THE HEART ABOUT FAMILY, OVERCOMING FEARS AND HER SECRET FANTASY LIFE

Nicole Kidman's resolution this year is to get out of the house more. "It's really an issue for me," says Nicole Kidman, laughing. I'm actually quite introverted by nature, and given the choice on any given evening, I have a tendency to want lo stay at home with my family, get into my pyjamas and go to bed early. But this year

I'm trying to change that. I've decided to get out more, be more part of the world and live life to the fullest. If people ask me out to dinner or to a party, I'm going to push myself to say yes instead of no. And actually, I have been going out a little bit more lately, so the resolution does seem to be working - although I know it's only the beginning of the year so I still have plenty of time to fall down on it."

Nicole Kidman looks pretty good for a shut-in this sunny afternoon in Beverly Hills, striding into the room

on those impossibly long legs, wearing a tailored powder-pink trouser suit over a crisp white blouse, her hair falling in soft golden curls around her delicate features. Nicole Kidman's on a break from filming Grace of Monaco and it's easy to see why she was cast as Grace Kelly, the celebrated Hollywood movie star and fashion icon who won the heart of a prince.

But, a little surprisingly, Nicole Kidman admits that when she was growing up in Sydney, the very last thing she felt was anything approaching fashionable.

"I wasn't comfortable with the way I looked at all," she remembers. "I so desperately wanted to be that kind of blonde, beachy, Aussie girl-next-door, but I just wasn't. I was very tall and very fair-skinned and I had red hair and, to make matters worse, because of my skin my mum wouldn't let me go to the beach during the day, so when everyone else was out sunbathing, I had to slay at home. I didn't really feel I lined in al all. Luckily, I filled my time with reading and that's what led me to being an actress."

Fast forward 30 years and Nicole Kidman says she's found it fascinating playing Princess Grace. "There's an

enormous responsibility playing somebody who has existed in real life and I approached her as a real person rather than a movie star or a princess. "There's a tendency for us all, when we see people who are far off, to want to put them on a pedestal, but I also want people to know that she was a woman, too, and to see what she really fell, what hurt her, what gave her confidence - all the aspects of her.

"I did a lot of research for this role and I have to say that the more I researched Grace, the more I came to love her because I found t hat she was a very good woman - a lovely person, really."

Much of the film has been shot in France and for Nicole, this was a golden opportunity to spend time in one of her favourite countries. "I first went there when I was 17. I went with my boyfriend, we stayed in a little attic room at the top of a B&B and I discovered red nine and baguettes and cheese. I've loved the place ever since - I'd love to buy a house there but my husband is like, 'Noooo!'.

"But I have been having fun working there. Because my little girls are not in school yet - Sunday's tour and Faith is only two — they've been able lo come with me and I was able to put Sunday into a little French school for a while, which was fun.

"I have a little room for them on the set with a bed for them to have a nap and everything. And because of

their ages, they're still very excited to be coming to the set and hanging out with mum. Probably in five or ten

years they'll be like, 'No way'."

The girls' father, Nicole's husband Keith Urban, has been flying in and out whenever his career as a country

music star permits. In the summer, the family will all be able to spend some time together when he takes them on his next tour. "We all go on the tour bus with him, which is a very- different experience," Nicole Kidman says. "It doesn't sound very relaxing but actually, it is quite relaxing for me because I'm not having to perform - that's his responsibility. So I can have some downtime and do some writing, which I've started to do. We're used to travelling around anyway. That's the beauty of being an actor and a musician - we get to be the gypsies of the world, going here and there."

SINGING THEIR OWN TUNE

Nicole Kidman says that both her daughters are already showing signs of inheriting their father's tiilent. "They both have music very strongly in their blood, which is a wonderful and amazing thing to me. I'm encouraging them as much as I can because I would love to have a little Urban Band one day.

"But really, they're their own little entities and as they grow up, they'll do what they want, which is just as it

should be. My own mother brought up my sister and me to believe we were to be our own people and not to conform to what anyone else expected and I think that's a nice way to bring up children. And if it means that they grow up a little wilful along the way - hey, I'd prefer that than having a very subseivient child anyway."

Nicole Kidman is soon to be seen in Stoker, a chiller about a dysfunctional family that holds a dark secret. Her character in it, the emotionally unstable mother of a disturbed teenager, could hardly be more different from the elegant Grace Kelly, but Nicole says that variety in work is what she seeks out.

"And you can't just play sugar-coated characters because life isn't sugar-coated, you know? I actually like

characters that are unusual, complicated, flawed. I like to explore the dark side sometimes. I have a very

strong fantasy life - and my fantasies arc not always well-behaved any more than life itself is."

INTERVIEW FOR HELLO! MAGAZINE: GABRIELLE DONNELLY

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