EXPATS Star Nicole Kidman Covers ELLE’s April 2024 ‘Impact’ Issue

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Nicole Kidman covers ELLE’s April 2024 Impact issue. Whether she’s confronting the toughest emotions onscreen, raising millions to support women’s causes, or putting on a pinstriped suit to help save the movies, the EXPATS star brings people together.

Journalist Tyler McCall spoke with Kidman about her famous AMC campaign, her philanthropy work, both local and global, season 3 of BIG LITTLE LIES, and how it’s her community that makes her real: “I have a very full life with people that I love. I’m raising daughters. I’m a wife, I’m a best friend. I’m a sister, I’m an aunt. I have deeply intimate relationships with people. And that, to me, is the meaning of life—and then taking care of what we leave behind, who we leave behind and how we do that, and our sense of respect for that.”

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On how she has loved every second of the internet fodder from her AMC campaign, including the growing trend of drag queens spoofing the AMC ad in their performances: “My dream will be to be onstage doing it with a drag queen,” she says. “I’ve got to be able to do that at some point.”

On how the September 2021 AMC campaign came together: She filmed it over one weekend while working on the movie Being the Ricardos, recruiting the film’s DP, Jeff Cronenweth, and her friend, Oscar-winning screenwriter Billy Ray, to make it happen. She felt it was her duty to answer AMC Theatres CEO Adam Aron’s call to help get people back into movie seats. “It was just the desire to keep cinemas alive,” Kidman says. “I’ve had the best experiences in cinema. I’d pretend I was going to school; I’d forge a note, and I’d go and sit in a movie theater. That’s a safe haven for me, so the idea of those not existing—that’s just not part of the equation in my lifetime.” … it’s all worth it to Kidman. “If that’s what it takes, I’ll do whatever it takes,” she says with a laugh. “We have to have some more ideas for the next one.”

On how one of the most intense scenes from Expat is based on a personal experience of Kidman’s: In one of the most striking scenes of the series, Margaret and her husband Clarke (played by Brian Tee) visit a morgue to view a body that matches the description of their son. Facing the body bag, Margaret starts laughing and finds herself unable to stop. Kidman made the suggestion based on her own experience viewing her father in his coffin. “I literally started laughing because I was so grief-stricken and so devastated. My body and my psyche just couldn’t handle it,” she says. “Even at other times in my life, I’ve laughed at inappropriate times because I have this weird short-circuiting. It’s like you need this moment to keep you alive, in a way, otherwise you’ll die. It’s too much pain.”

On how Expats required emotional work that could be daunting for some actors, but how is the kind of material Kidman is drawn to: “I’m fortunate that I’ve got a job where I get to explore emotional landscapes that are heavy, strange, extraordinary, bizarre, beautiful, deep,” she says. “I don’t shy away from them, partly because I’m committed to examining life, what it means to be alive and feel.”

On being an active part of her community in Tennessee, from visiting children’s hospitals to running out to buy diapers for the school donation drive: “I like being a part of something not about my work, not about who I am, none of that. Just a citizen who’s in the world. And my kids love that, too, when I do that,” she says.

On spending time with her two daughters she has with Keith Urban: When they’re home, Kidman loves that their house is where all the girls’ friends gather. “I love teenage girls. I just find them exquisite,” she says. “I marvel at that age group and what they’re dealing with, but also their ability to handle so much.”

On how her daughter Sunday is at least partially responsible for Big Little Lies getting a third season: “My daughter is the one who watched both of the series and went, ‘Okay, there’s just no question, there has to be a third,’” she says, adding with a laugh that her daughter even gives notes on character development. “She’s like, ‘Celeste, she’s not coping in the second one, what is she doing? I could kind of see the point of view of Mary Louise.’”

On Big Little Lies Season 3: Kidman confirms that she and Reese Witherspoon have been texting about the third season, both feeling the timing is right to revisit their characters. “There’s the richness of the storylines, which we’d always discussed, but it needed time because there’s actual unbelievable depth to the next chapter of these women’s lives and their children’s lives—because children grow up, and that’s kind of fascinating,” Kidman says. She also says that there’s even a timeline in place for making it happen with the rest of the cast—which she cheekily declines to share. The Big Little Lies costars are in big demand, and it’s daunting to consider lining up those A-list calendars, but Kidman says the real friendships they’ve built with each other on set make it easy. “I think when you’re all scattered and never sort of cross paths, it’s very, very different. But when you’re all still very intertwined, that’s what makes it doable, because there’s a willingness and you want to spend time together,” she says.

On how as much fun as she has playing with fashion and working with brands like Balenciaga, which recently named her an ambassador, she’s also more than happy to skip the after-parties: “It feels a little unreal at times. I want to get out, take my dress off, and put my jammies on. It’s kind of like the opposite of Cinderella—I’m happy to go home and just go back to me,” she admits. “It does feel a little overwhelming. I’m like, ‘I need to go home now. I’m very tired. I want to get warm, and I want to curl up, and I want to feel real.’”

On how it’s her community that makes her real: “I have a very full life with people that I love. I’m raising daughters. I’m a wife, I’m a best friend. I’m a sister, I’m an aunt. I have deeply intimate relationships with people. And that, to me, is the meaning of life—and then taking care of what we leave behind, who we leave behind and how we do that, and our sense of respect for that.”

[Photo Credit: Mario Sorrenti for ELLE Magazine]

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