|
|
Nicole Mary Kidman was born
June 20, 1967 in Honolulu, Hawaii the first of
two daughters, to Anthony and Janelle; Nicole has
a younger sister Antonia. Nicole spent the first
three years of her life in Washington D.C where
her father, a a biochemist and clinical
psychologist, pursued his research on breast
cancer before returning to their native Sydney,
Australia. As a child Nicole studied
ballet, mime and drama. Sprouting to 5'10 the
naturally curly auburn haired blue eyed Nicole
found herself gawky and didn't have many dates,
her first kiss was on stage. At 16 Nicole dropped
out of High School to pursue her love of acting
and in 1983 appeared in the Australian holiday
show Bush Christmas. After her first
role, Nicole appeared in more Australian series
such as BMXBandits, also in 1983. When Nicole
was seventeen she was a singer in a four girl
three guy band named Divine Madness,it was also
that. In 1986 Nicole appeared in a mini series
titled Vietnam in which she portrayed a
Vietnam schoolgirl protester and won an
Australian Film Institute Award.
After finding an American
agent, Nicole appeared in her first film Dead
Calm with Sam Neil and Billy Zane in 1989.
Nicole didn't become a
household name until she appeared in the film Days
Of Thunder with Tom Cruise. The film opened
in July of 1990 and the couple eventually wed in
Telluride,Colorado on December 24, 1990. Nicole
then went on to appear in the Australian film Flirting
and the film adaptation of the E.L Doctorow novel Billy Bathgate in
1991, in Ron Howard's semi-autographical film
Far and Away with her husband in 1992,
the tear jerker My Life with Michael
Keaton and the thriller Malice with Alec
Baldwin and Bill Pullman. 1993 was a good year
for Nicole, it was also the year she became a
mother to Isabella Rose whom she adopted as a
newborn.
Nicole continued to work
steadily dividing her time between being an
actress, wife and mother. In 1995 she appeared in
the blockbuster film Batman Forever in
which she played the newest love in the life of
the caped crusader, not to mention his
psychiatrist, and the black comedy To Die For
in which she portrayed a maniacal weather girl
who seduces a teenage boy into killing her
husband in her own vain efforts to become famous.
"Im so happyto live in a country where life,
liberty and all the rest of that still stand for
something." was one of the best lines in the
film. The film received favorable reviews,
especially on Nicole's part showing that she had
finally stepped outside the shadow of her famous
husband. The same year Nicole and Tom adopted a
second child, a baby boy they named Connor
Anthony.
In January 1996 Nicole took home a Golden Globe
Award for her role in To Die For and
then went on to star in the Henry James
adaptation of Portrait Of A Lady
directed by Oscar Nominee Jane Champion and
costarring John Malcovich.
The
next year she starred along side George Clooney
in The Peacemaker which dealt with
nuclear war
Nicole was balancing homelife and her work
equally well, making one movie a year while still
spending plenty of time with
her children and husband. In 1998 she starred
with Sandra Bullock in the film Practical
Magic in which they played sisters whom just
happened to also be witches
and that winter made her
Broadway debut on December 13, 1998 in The Blue
Room an erotic play that remained nearly sold out
for all of its 111 performances.The next year she
teamed up with her husband for their third film
together in Stanley Kubricks last film the auto
erotic Eyes Wide Shut.
Unfortunately Nicole didn't make headlines again
until February 2001 where it was made public that
she and her husband were separating. Only going
from bad to worse Nicole then suffered a
miscarriage.
As if life is a series of
roller coasters, life picked up again with the
June 4, 2001, release of Baz Luhrmanns musical
drama comedy Moulin Rouge where she
portrayed a singing and dancing prostitute who
more then anything wanted to be a real actress.
The musical was a roller coaster ride itself,
with elaborate dance sequences and musical numbers
of every song from "Like A Virgin" to
"We Could Be Heroes." The film received
very mixed reviews; everything from "EXCELLENT!"
to "COMPLETE GARBAGE!" The film slowly
became a cult hit and only a few months later her
next film The Others about a mother who
unknowingly moves her sick children to a haunted
house. The film received rave reviews and made
over 100 Million dollars in it's box office run.
On July 31, 2001 in seven minutes Nicole and
Tom's divorce became final (with the "who
gets what" to be determined later) but she
didn't let heartbreak stop her from touring the
world to promote her films.
The
off camera Nicole is just as amazing as the
people she plays on screen. Being a cancer advocate for
breast cancer after her mothers battle with it
when Nicole was seventeen, Nicole has worked with
the UCLA Woman's Reproductive Cancer Program
since 1995 and for the past seven years has
served as a goodwill ambassador for the United
Nations Children's Fund in Australia.
On
December 20, 2001 Nicole made Golden Globe
history for being nominated for both Moulin
Rouge (Best Actress in a Musical Or Comedy)
and The Others ( Best Actress in a Drama).
With two more films due to be realeased in 2002
and a certain Oscar Nomination in her favor, it
looks like Nicole really will survive.
|