Wednesday
Jun202018
Three Questions for Nicole Kidman's Birthday
Wednesday, June 20, 2018 at 4:58PM 
We went all out for Nicole Kidman's 50th birthday last year with 50 Appropriate Ways to Celebrate so this year on her 51st (happy birthday diva!) we'll keep it simpler.
Answer me these questions three in the comments:
- What's your favorite performance of hers that isn't from her legend-making 2001-2004 run (i.e. The Others-Moulin Rouge!-The Hours-Cold Mountain-Dogville-Birth what a genius run that was!)
- What single scene -- minus the opera seen in Birth --pops into your head the most when her name is invoked?
- What's a performance of hers that you haven't seen (she works so much you're surely missing something!) that you're most curious about?
and if you're on twitter go really crazy and do the 10 question meme
Reader Comments (64)
I;ll be first then
1 - The Portrait of a Lady is my favourite performance outside of her Imperial Phase,the film itelf resonates now far more than Campion's The Piano,only Shelley Winters spoils it.
2 - There are 2 many that spring to mind but a Top 3
a - Hearing the truth about Mdme Merle and Gilbert in The Portriat of a Lady,hands clasped over mouths always gets me.
b - Being a total bitch to Bill Pullman in Malice
c - The angels aren't real scene from Rabbit Hole
3 - I haven't scene The Golden Compass or Paddington,I don't like kids films.I'd have to go with My Life does anyone remember that
01. Eyes Wide Shut
02. The train station scene in The Hours / The opening scream in The Others/ The hysteria marijane scene in Eyes Wide Shut
03. The Portrait of a Lady
1. Margot at the Wedding
2. Celeste in the therapist's office in Big Little Lies
3. Grace of Monoco
1. Rabbit Hole
2. The rain scene in The Hours
3. I, uhh, haven’t seen Birth (cowers in shame)
1) The Portrait of a Lady. She's fantastic in it.
2) Come What May
3) The Herzog movie
1. Rabbit Hole
2. "Personally speaking, I can't wait to watch life tear you apart" from Stoker, or her entrance in The Golden Compass (the first movie I watched starring Nicole!)
3. Practical Magic
I just realised I misread question 2 as pops into your head first, not most, whoops! For the scene that pops into my head the most, it would be the bowling alley scene in Rabbit Hole.
1. To Die For
2. Celeste with a tennis racket in Big Little Lies; Charlotte peeing in the Paperboy; sitting on the floor talking to her mom (the Wiest) while going through boxes in Rabbit Hole
3. Stoker or Portrait of a Lady
1. Portrait of a Lady
2. Her truth-telling monologue in Eyes Wide Shut
3. I haven't seen Queen of the Desert. Eager to see that.
1. The Portrait of a Lady, my favorite performance of hers period
2. Monologue in Eyes Wide Shut
3. The Others, which I own on dvd but still haven’t watched for some reason
1. What a hard question because there are a lot of directions I could go. I could pick one of many performances where the production itself was so-so but she was the best part about it (Australia, Practical Magic, The Paperboy, Malice). Or other defining star-turns outside this era (To Die For, Eyes Wide Shut, Margot, Big Little Lies). I guess I'll go with Big Little Lies - she's such a force and the range she gets to flaunt echos her best work in the early aughts.
2. The final scene in Eyes Wide Shut. So brilliantly delivered.
3. I haven't yet seen The Family Fang, need to fix that.
1. Rabbit Hole.
2. The group therapy scenes in Rabbit Hole and couple therapy scenes in Big Little Lies.
3. Margot at the Wedding.
1. I do miss those ginger locks of hair from the early 90's, but "To Die For" is when I really noticed that Girl. Can. Act. Where was that Oscar nomination then?
2. "You're not anyone in America unless you're on TV" - Prescient words in 1995
3. Australia, which looks like a good rainy day Sunday movie?
1. To Die For
2. The scene of her dancing in the rain to "Sweet Home Alabama" in To Die For
3. Wow.... that's a tough question to answer. I have Queen of the Desert in my DVR queue so that is the one I'm eager to see.
1. Eyes Wide Shut. Love this movie. It's surprisingly funny, and while the much discussed orgy is (purposefully) rigid and mechanical, Kidman is damn sexy in it.
2. Again, Eyes Wide Shut, nearly all of her lines are spoken when she's sleepy, drunk, or high. I love the way she says, "I'm Alice Harford, I'm American." But I love that look she gives in that gif you're featuring. She's looking adoringly at her husband, who in turn thinks she's goading him on and remembering her saying, "I was fucking so many men." And of course, the beginning of the movie. The screenplay reads: Alice, a beautiful woman with her back to camera, let's drop one elegant black dress to the floor. I could go on and on about this movie, and her in it.
3. I'm preparing to be shamed, but I don't know how I still haven't manged to see Portrait of a Lady.
1) To Die For/Rabbit Hole (cheating, I know, but I love them both so much and they both speak so well to the different phases and moods of Kidman's career)
2) SO MANY! The monologue in Eyes Wide Shut is probably what pops to mine first though.
3) I've never seen Fur and really, really want to see it.
1. The Paperboy
2. Oddly enough the trailer for The Stepford Wives!
3. Practical Magic
1) To Die For
2) Two of them: her monologue in Stoker (one of my favorite moments in film in the last decade), and when she turns against the town at the end of Dogville
3) How to Talk to Girls at Parties
1- The Paperboy- a masterclass from a true risk falar
2 - Therapy scenes in BLL and bathtub scene in Lion ...Nicole truly delivering layers and layers of emotions with superb and subtle acting
3- Top of the Lake China girl. Liked the character but couldnt relate much tô the plot ...gonna try it again cause I just loved the first deason
1. BMX Bandits ... duh!
2. "Hang on to your husbands!" from Practical Magic (don't pretend like you don't love it!).
3. I missed The Beguiled because I really like the original. But I should see it.
you are all making me so excited about her all over again.
1. To Die For
2. Her character attending therapy in Big Little Lies, the best scenes of the show;
3. The Family Fang; Just Go With It and her early movies before "Dead Calm".
1. Big Little Lies (r/u: Lion, To die for, Eyes Wide Shut)
2. her monologue at the end of The Others
3. The Paperboy (but I dare not watch it)
Happy Birthday, Nic!
1. To Die For or her smashing appearance at the 2001 Golden Globes, just as news broke that Tom Cruise had filed for divorce, where she presented an award to George Clooney looking very Grace Kelly-esque. (P.S. The Stepford Wives is technically from her legend-making 2001-2004 run, sandwiched right in between Dogville and Birth. But I digress...)
2. The glass-shattering scene in Malice, the final scene in Birth, and the emotional breakdown scene in Rabbit Hole, and the "breakthrough" therapy session scene all vie for immediately-come-to-mind.
3. I've never seen Billy Bathgate and have always been kind of curious about it (mainly by virtue of her Golden Globe nod). How to Talk to Girls at Parties is also top of the list -- but has it ever even been released in theaters?
See also: Birthday Girl (questions 1 & 3 above)
1- Eyes Wide Shut.
2- Her final line in Eyes Wide Shut.
3- Strangerland.
1. To Die For or The Paperboy - the first is just iconic and influential and the second is just balls to the wall risk taking that none of her contemporaries would even dare try (outside of Isabelle or Tilda).
2. It's very recent but the therapy scenes in Big Little Lies or the scene in the last episode in the car with Skarsgard where she finally decides to end it. Also "Well then, can you take some advice from a friend? You keep your fuckin' mouth shut. :) " from To Die For.
3. I've seen it, but I'm really interested to see her performance in Strangerland again. Her work in it is very interesting and raw.
My favorite living actress! Happy birthday, Nic!
1. The obvious choice: To Die For. The fun choice: Practical Magic.
2. The scene at the train station in The Hours. The scene in Rabbit Hole where Howie accuses Becca of intentionally erasing the video of their son. "You were supposed to love me weren't you?" from Stoker.
I actually have these three scenes saved on my phone and watch them regularly.
3. Flirting.
1. To Die For. Her best bar none, even if I included her great early aughts run.
2. Weirdly enough Sparkling Diamonds from Moulin Rouge! Mostly cause it's such a STAR, bold, dazzling moment. Maybe not her most impactful scene but remains for me her most memorable.
3. Billy Bathgate is the only one of her "major" works that I'm missing
1. To Die For (Margot is a close second)
2. Job interview scene in To Die For
3. Bangkok Hilton
1. The Paperboy and To Die For
2. Satine rolling in the floor screaming in MR! and her face when Christian starts singing, that was the moment I knew I was going to love her forever.
3. Sadly I've never seen Portrait of a Lady.
1. Birth (still her best IMO).
2. Recently, it's been the sessions between Celeste and her therapist in 'Big Little Lies.'
3. Dead Calm.
1. To Die For
2. That confrontation scene with Aaron Eckhart in Rabbit Hole
3. I have had Malice recorded for a while and haven’t gotten around to watching it yet. Curious about her performance in that.
1. I am eternally an adolescent and have to go with Batman Forever. I knew who she was because even as a 9 year old I loved movies and celebrity, but her in that movie is very vivid for me.
2. I have to go with Big Little Lies when Laura Dern, as EVERY sanctimonious mom you knew at some point, fails in convincing her estemed peers to do a show like "Oklahoma!" instead of "Avenue Q", and Kidman's Celeste very calmly tells her that the First Amendment will allow the theater to do any show they damn well please. This answer is slightly cheating because its exclamation point cuts to the nezt scene where Reese Witherspoon yells "YES! STICK IT UP YOUR ASS!" but its when she remembers -- and the audience realizes -- how accomplished, strong, and victorious Celeste can be
3. Lion
1.Fur (also my favorite movie of hers)
2. Not a scene but when her voice becomes whispery.
3. The Human Stain
1. The Paperboy. Even though I love her something awful, I never thought she had THAT in her.
2. The first thing that comes to mind are actually the posters for The Others and To Die For, not any particular scene, but.... PROBABLY "Sparkling Diamonds" from Moulin Rouge!
3. I still haven't seen Birth.
1) Margot at the Wedding, easily. Genius performance that deserves to be recognized more than it is.
2) The end scene of 'Eyes Wide Shut', after having cried for hours.
3) 'To Die For'. Just hasn't happened for whatever reason!
1. Rabbit Hole
2. Your Song or One Day I'll Fly Away
3. After seeing your post, I need to get around to Flirting
1. I'll echo a good chunk of people and say Margot at the Wedding
2. The monologue from Eyes Wide Shut or her facial expressions of "Le Tango de Roxanne"
3. Big Little Lies
1-Rabbit Hole
2-Peeing on Efron in The Paperboy (she was BRILLIANT in it should've been Oscar #3)
3-Bewitch (people hated so much!)
Bewithed? (The Nora Efron deseater) sorry I am operating on a second language, the one with Will Ferral
1. To Die For
2. The final scene in Birth. Devastating. A close second: The train station scene in The Hours. Could be taught in an acting master class.
3. The Beguiled
1) This is bottom of the barrel, but I just want to defend her wrongfully Razzie Nominated performance in Just Go With It. No one has given a more Adam Sandler Movie performance that our wonderful Nic. She clearly made a very conscious decision to have fun, and that's exactly what she is! She truly can do no wrong!!!!!
2) I won't deny I'm late to the game, but my true introduction to Nic isn't until 2009/10, and I have seared in my brain both the tragic catharsis of her prom night breakdown in Rabbit Hole, as well as her unapologetic diva antics crying "Where's the script" in Nine.
3) I've never seen To Die For. I'm a late bloomer.
I gotta be honest here
1) The Interpreter (her chemistry with Sean Penn is fantastic)
2) When she writhes on the floor during Christian's poetry reading (Satine is a tricky character, and that's the moment I knew she was all in)
3) To Die For
@Craig the final scene of Birth is amazing. I think about just as often as the opera scene, maybe even a little more. It's absolutely devastating.
1. To Die For. A masterpiece. I wish Suzanne had another ending, like triumphing or, at last, a more open/ambiguous one that left us to judge the character.
2. The star entrance in Moulin Rouge, one of the best, level Marilyn Monroe in Some Like It Hot - probably the best of all times and a masterclass of Billy Wilder - and Jack Nicholson in The Witches of Eastwick.
3. Never saw Margot At The Wedding. I don't know why, but of her acclaimed works, never by far.
1. To Die For
2. "Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend"
3. Hemingway & Gelhorn!
And I did the Twitter questionaire as a thread over there --> https://twitter.com/glenndunks/status/1009657685451534337
- The Portrait of a Lady. I say since forever that this movie is criminally underrated, her performance is transcendental and should be discussed more often.
- Every frame from Moulin Rouge. All by myself moment in To Die For. The train station scene in The Hours.
- Maybe only Practical Magic and How To Talk To Girls at Parties. I think I've seen all of her movies I wanted to see.
Happy Birthday Nic and thanks Nathaniel for always being her Champion!
1. As an Aussie girl who is the same age as Nicole (I'm 51 in August) I grew up with her on TV. Her performances in the mini-series Vietnam in 1987 and Bangkok Hilton in 1989 were era defining for me. Her return to TV mini-series in Big Little Lies and China Girl has been wonderful.
2. When she tells Harold Zidler that she doesn't care about the Moulin Rouge and she is leaving with Christian...then Harold says "You're dying Satine" and she realises that she can't leave with Christian after all and she has to pull herself together and oh I just break down every time... "I was a fool to believe..."
3. I have yet to see The Beguiled and Killing of a Sacred Deer. Are they on iTunes? I might have a Nicole day tomorrow.
1) Rabbit Hole. Great acting, wonderful movie and cool posters
2) I finally, after years of refusal, watched Far And Away weeks ago and the scene with 90s Tom Cruise naked with a bowl hiding his intimate parts can't get out of my mind. Hilarious. A pity the movie is not so good - Nicole is wonderful like always in an obstinate role, but Tom Cruise (never so hot) as an irish immigrant, seriously? And when she shaves Robert Downey Jr in Fur, a beautifully strange and sad movie, marvelous.
3) I will watch Stoker and Genius as soon as possible.