Nicole Kidman Says She Got ‘Bruises’ on Her Body From Big Little Lies

Nicole Kidman dives deep into the characters she plays, so much so that she has the physical scars to prove it.

“I find sometimes that it’s really taxing when you’re going through all of those emotions that are so intense and deep that your health, actually, you get, sort of — your mind doesn’t [know that it’s fake],” Kidman, 57, shared in her Variety “Actors on Actors” conversation with Zendaya on Friday, December 13. “You’re actually putting yourself through it, and you have to have ways to get rid of that.”

The Oscar winner recalled how filming the HBO series Big Little Lies — which ran for two seasons from 2017 to 2019, with its third season currently in the works — took a particularly tough toll on her. “That was disturbing to my body and my psyche because I couldn’t tell what was real and what wasn’t,” she explained. “So, it was just like, ‘Oof. This is hard.’” (Kidman stars as Celeste in the series, who is abused by her husband, Perry, played by Alexander Skarsgård.)

She continued: “I would have real bruises all over my back and body and legs. And so, I’d be seeing it and my brain would say, ‘Well, hold on. You’re hurt.’ So, I do, sort of these things that clean my chakras and pray and do all of this, you know, and get out the sage. Honestly, I’m like, ‘I’ll take whatever. Just get me here so that I can step into the next place free and not scarred or damaged or wounded,’ which sounds like I’m bats— crazy, but I’m not.”

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Kidman went through a similar, and “very intense,” experience shooting her latest movie, Babygirl. The film, which hits theaters later this month, stars Kidman as a CEO who puts her family and work life at risk by beginning a steamy affair with a young intern, played by Harris Dickinson.

“There were parts of Babygirl that are not now in the film but that fed onto it that we shot that kind of, yeah, just after a period, it was exhausting,” she stated. “But it was also just emotionally disturbing, would be how I put it.”

Learning to take care of herself while giving her all to a performance is something Kidman said she’s “not great at.” She added: “I’m still learning not to sacrifice my body and myself for one, the sake of the art, because part of me almost wants to. And two, just having to value who I am. So, it’s a journey.”

While chatting about Babygirl in an October interview with Variety, Kidman admitted that she found “the whole thing” to be difficult to film. “Because the nature of that film, it was either going to be completely vulnerable and exposed, or you were going to be protected, and then the thing wouldn’t connect,” she said at the time. “When I met with [director] Halina [Reijn], and we talked through it, I was just like, ‘Just give us a safe space,’ and then, ‘Please don’t make me look like a fool.’”

Despite experiencing some physical and mental turmoil during the production process, Kidman called Babygirl a “very releasing film” in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter earlier this month. “I’ve had some people say it’s the most disturbing film they’ve ever seen, which I’m like, ‘Oh no, I’m so sorry,’” she said.

Kidman noted that she’s also excited to bring a new kind of female-centric story to the big screen. “A lot of times women are discarded at a certain period of their career as a sexual being. So, it was really beautiful to be seen in this way,” she explained. “From the minute I read it, I was like, ‘Yeah, this is a voice I haven’t seen, this is a place that I haven’t been, I don’t think audiences have been.’ My character has reached a stage where she’s got all this power, but she’s not sure who she is, what she wants, what she desires, even though she seems to have it all. And I think that’s really relatable.”

Babygirl hits theaters on Wednesday, December 25.