One For Them, One For Me: Nicole Kidman - 'The Stepford Wives' and 'Birth'
Friday, February 11, 2022 at 12:30PM A new series by Christopher James
Nicole Kidman at the Globes for Birth. They were the only group to embrace the film
Do one for them; do one for you. If you can still do projects for yourself, you can keep your soul.
— Martin Scorsese: A Journey
This week, Nicole Kidman earned her fifth Oscar nomination for Being the Ricardos, where she plays legendary star Lucille Ball. One can’t spend over thirty years in the industry without a couple of reinventions. The Australian star rose to prominence in America when she became Mrs. Tom Cruise after Days of Thunder. The entire 90s was spent breaking out of that reductive box. It wasn’t until the summer of 2001, when Kidman divorced Cruise, that she stepped into her own as a true A-list star. The one-two-three punch of The Others, Moulin Rouge and The Hours cemented her as both a real actress and a true movie star, culminating in a win for Best Actress for The Hours. At the top of the heap, Kidman decided to take many 'One For Them, One For Me' swings. They didn't always pan out but this post-Oscar period contains some of her best work.
Before her Oscar win she's already filmed The Human Stain, Dogville and Cold Mountain. So 2004 was the year where she really used her cache to gain both cultural clout and big box office...
Birth was a passion project that was mocked at the time, but now has a passionate fanbase. Meanwhile, The Stepford Wives was a fascinating, yet unsuccessful, remake that allowed Kidman to mock her brand as “ice princess” in hopes audiences would turn out. Audiences and critics didn’t turn out for either, but it’s a perfect encapsulation of the two faces of this movie star.
If one were to apply broad categorization to these movies, one could say this was Nicole Kidman’s year of “horror movies,” though neither are that simple. The Stepford Wives is a dark comedy, not unlike Bowfinger by way of The Twilight Zone. Meanwhile, Birth is something wholly original, as if it were an A24 movie before A24. It’s about grief, love and the boundaries we are willing to push based on those emotions. Similarly, these could both be grouped as “Nicole Kidman” movies, but even that doesn’t provide much of a throughline. Birth represents auteur-Nicole, an actress who wants to be challenged by her director and pushed to her limits as an actress. Meanwhile, The Stepford Wives is a skewering of the public persona of Kidman. She had been considered a “Stepford” esque star and wife of Tom Cruise. Could she continue being a star by playing into people’s perception of her?
73 Questions with Nicole Kidman (go to 6:12 for Birth)
As mentioned in her Vanity Fair 73 Questions interview, Birth is the one film of hers that Nicole Kidman wishes people had seen. Over time, audiences caught up to this assertion. In Guy Lodge’s Kidman World Cup, Birth made it to the finals, losing only to her incredible work in To Die For. Still, the movie is rotten both in its Rotten Tomatoes critic score and audience score. Why might that be?
The movie is challenging not in its gratuity, but in its subject matter. In the opening scene, a man has a heart attack while running and dies instantly. Ten years pass and we meet his widow, Anna (Kidman), about to wed another man, Joseph (Danny Huston). A 10-year-old sneaks up to the party and interrupts it. His name is Sean (Cameron Bright) and he begs Anna not to marry Joseph, the reason being that he is Anna’s previous husband, Sean, reincarnated. Anna laughs this off initially, bringing Sean back to his mother (Cara Seymour). However, as time goes on, she entertains the idea that Sean may be reincarnated in the body of this little boy and she may be getting a second chance at love.
Never miss an opportunity to use the "Nicole Kidman at the opera in Birth" gif.
“It’s a movie about love,” Kidman says in a Charlie Rose interview alongside director Jonathan Glazer. What Birth supposes is this overwhelming sort of love can be as much of a burden as it is a reason to live. Anna wants so badly for Sean to be back that she considers embarking on an illegal relationship with this 10-year-old. Kidman has an incredible ability to bring us into Anna’s reality. Her outing at the opera is awe-inspiring. In a minute long closeup, Kidman takes us through an entire three-act play of Anna considering, denying and finally accepting that Sean may be telling the truth.
Luckily, the movie doesn’t just exist within Anna’s perspective. Her judgmental mother, embodied iconically by Lauren Bacall, and sister, Laura (Alison Elliott), both take every opportunity they have to pull Anna back from the brink. Perhaps the most harrowing scene of the film comes when Anna visits Sean’s best friend Clifford (Peter Stromare) and his wife Clara (Anne Heche, incredible). It’s the first time she opens up about her feelings on the situation. She constantly scans their faces, seeing if there is any judgment or disdain. Anna wants to find a way to be with Sean, but realizes that she can’t fully recreate the life they had - the same friends, the same dynamic, the same appearance.
[SPOILER ALERT]
Where does Birth leave Anna? Despair, of course - but at least there’s a wedding. It’s finally proven to Anna that Sean is not the reincarnation of her husband, so she goes through with the marriage to Joseph. Yet, the experience has unlocked something within her. She wanted it to be true. She wants her husband, not this new person. Grief still consumes her as she walks to the ocean in her wedding dress. Kidman unearths something raw and wrenching in these final moments with Anna. She’s discussed how the night she won her Oscar was one of her lonelier evenings, and this performance taps into that. Anna is on her wedding day and rather than it be a joyous occasion, it’s one that reminds her only of what she’s lost.
[END SPOILERS]
2004 will forever be remembered as the year Nicole Kidman committed hard-core to the short wig.
The Stepford Wives starts out with a bang… literally. Kidman’s Joanna Eberhart is a tough as nails studio executive doing a perfect send up of network upfronts. Her callousness comes back to bite her when the subject of one of her reality shows (played by Mike White) goes on a sexist rant and shoots her, though not fatally. She wakes up to her doting husband, Walter Kresby (Matthew Broderick), informing her that she no longer has a job and that they will have to move to the Stepford community in Connecticut. Immediately, the short-haired, dressed in black Joanna feels no connection with the sunny socialites of Stepford. Meanwhile, Walter is taken in by the Men’s Club, who have nefarious plans to keep their wives in order.
There’s so many jokes that land in The Stepford Wives that it’s hard to contend with how grossly the movie misses its mark. The best parts of the film come when Joanna finds her kindred spirits in messy novelist Bobbie Markowitz (Bette Midler) and flaming architect Roger Bannister (Roger Bart). Both of them are content in their non-conformity and happy to stick out like sore thumbs. However, Joanna gets it in her head that she should try and be more Stepford, that conforming will make them happier. This undercuts most of the conflict in the movie, as it removes her from actively looking into what is clearly weird about the town. We still get fun jokes where Faith Hill goes on the fritz or where the boobs of the Stepford wives increase. Yet, Kidman’s Joanna is supposed to be our pushback but instead feels drawn to the dark side. It’s not until Roger and Bobbie are Stepford-ized against their will that Joanna wakes up.
Compare Stepford Nicole to her Golden Globes outfit that year.
[SPOILER ALERT]
The final act of The Stepford Wives suggests a much more interesting movie and performance, though it never quite commits to it. At first, we think that Joanna has gone through the Stepford process, coming out of it looking like the blonde, fashion Nicole Kidman that we all know. There’s something funny about Nicole making her traditional image be the face of the robotic, Stepford version of Joanna. However, this is only just a part of Joanna and Walter’s plan. At a dinner banquet, Joanna reveals she was only “pretending” to be Stepford and Walter flips the switch on all the women, turning them back into their former selves. We get an incredible Glenn Close monologue, but it all feels anticlimactic and outside of Joanna’s control.
[END SPOILERS]
How much better could the movie have been if Joanna had been a more active character? There seemed to be something enticing about Nicole mocking her own glamour fashionista persona. Why not send that up more? To Die For proves that she’s great at satirizing vapidity. Meanwhile, Birth demonstrates that Kidman is interested in using her cache and celebrity to bankroll controversial, independent cinema. She has the teeth and the humor to be the face of a modern Stepford Wives, so why does it all fall so flat?
This began the period of “Box Office Poison” Nicole Kidman that would continue through the 2000s. However, the turning point came when Kidman started Blossom Films, making Rabbit Hole which earned her a third Oscar nomination for Best Actress. From there, her producing savvy helped her career resurge with the HBO miniseries Big Little Lies, re-establishing her as the top of the A-list. Still, Kidman’s choices this period are a perfect encapsulation of why we should celebrate her. They’re bold, innovative and, even when they fail, they have a perspective on her as a celebrity, star and actress.
Previous Entries in One For Them, One For Me
- Mike White (x2) in 2017 - Beatriz at Dinner, The Emoji Movie, Brad's Status and Pitch Perfect 3
- M. Night Shyamalan's 1999 - The Sixth Sense and Stuart Little
- Noah Baumbach's 2013 - Frances Ha and Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted
What is your favorite Nicole Kidman? Let us know in the comments below.
Reader Comments (9)
THE STEPFORD WIVES is heaps of fun - and far more satisfying than something like say, BEWITCHED.
TSW is a Kidman favourite of mine I find it tonally camp and hilarious Glenn Close and Bette Midler having heaps of fun but Birth apart from the now iconic amongst Kidman fans close up a bit of a chore to watch.
Nicole is interesting, because she's always been more of a 5 for me, 1 for them kind of gal.
I will say, that I've always been more fond of her big budget stuff where she plays a key supporting role (e.g., Aquaman, Padington, The Prom) than stuff like Stepford and Bewitched. She just seems far more comfortable creating compelling supporting characters in those projects rather than playing a generic protagonist.
I kind of like this moment she's in right now, where everything is a bit more mixed. I tend to think of some of her high-profile tv shows as being for them (e.g., Undoing, Nine Perfect Strangers) and some of her more daring work being for herself (e.g., Beguiled, Destroyer).
Birth is the her high point in a career of high points. The opera scene is amazing, but she does so much in other scenes. Even just ones between her and Bacall. The ending, however, is unforgettable. I do hope criterion releases this one day.
I love so much of Nicole Kidman's work. As a young and gay preteen I discovered the library offered so much to me that other places couldn't. I remember reading Joyce Maynard's "To Die For" only because I knew Nicole was going to be in the movie. My parents found it and forbid me from reading it, which only causes me to read it tucked away in a library corner.
She's a tremendous actress who takes so many risky parts.
Tilda Swinton has been lauded for her choices, but why hasn't Nicole?
I was not aware of the Kidman World Cup, but I agree with all its choices.
Favorite Kidman is a close to impossible question, but if pressed - Stoker or Dogville, though I'm inclined to say To Die For is still her best. But she's pretty much always great, and her ability to do almost anything across types of roles and genres is remarkable. Heck, nothing against Ruth Wilson, but I'd have loved seeing hours of Kidman's Mrs. Coulter, and to do that and Birth - that's range.
2001-2004 Kidman is an absolute WOW
Cold Mountain is an unfortunate event, but you can easily give her Oscars for The Others, The Hours, Moulin Rouge, Birth, Dogville
The two Kidman films I've seen countless of times are The Hours and Birth. If I were the Academy I'd give her Oscars for these two performances. So yes, in my universe the Academy got it right with her Oscar win (everything about Far From Heaven is wonderful - yes, and... I've never cared to rewatch it - also yes).
Birth is an incredible film - I will never forget that last scene of Kidman wading in the ocean in her wedding dress. THAT should have been her second Oscar.
I remember when EYES WIDE SHUT opened and i said I thought Kidman was the best thing in it and that the film suffered as soon as she was more or less out of the picture for that long stretch in the middle. I had friends in graduate school tell me I was crazy. But I think that response holds up pretty well, if I do say so myself.
to "get" Frank Oz's "The Stepford Wives" you have to "get" first that Oz LOVES being meta with Hollywood tropes and uses them subversively (no better example than the climax of In & Out at the "Teacher of the year" scene, which is deliberatedly anticlimatic and ridiculous and camp and full of cheese, spoofing in a meta way the "Dead Poets Society" climax trope)
TSW isn't a great film, and not Frank Oz's best film (Little Shop of Horrors, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and In & Out may be his trio of masterpieces) but it is hugely entertaining and full of great puns.A good, if somewhat flawed, satire.