For decades, film actors have gone to extraordinary lengths to find their characters—risking their health, safety, and sanity as part of their Method. And when Nicole Kidman decided to dabble in television—for HBO’s Big Little Lies—the actress found herself going further for her character than she had for any film role in her Oscar-winning career.
For those who have not yet seen the David E. Kelley-scripted, Jean-Marc Vallée-directed series—which is based on Liane Moriarty’s best-selling novel—Big Little Lies is a visually dreamy drama about four beautiful mothers living in an affluent Monterey, California, community. Every home seems to be a beachside mansion; every table is topped with glasses of chilled rosé; and (almost) every woman is outfitted in designer wear. Beneath this aspirational exterior, though, is the pain each woman endures in her interior life—with Celeste, the character played by Kidman, suffering the most physically and emotionally, at the hands of her abusive husband (Alexander Skarsgård). And when Kidman, who also executive-produced the series, first met with Moriarty, the author agreed to let Kidman adapt the novel on one condition—that she play Celeste, the complicated character who vacillates between episodes of abuse, passionate sex, and a disturbing combination of both.
Speaking ahead of the show’s finale—airing this Sunday—Kidman revealed how much Celeste’s painful trajectory ended up affecting her.
“I didn’t realize how much of it penetrated me,” Kidman told Vogue of her character’s experience, particularly the physical abuse. “I would go home at night sometimes and be in a lot of pain, and I had to take things like Advil, because I was being thrown around physically. I was really bruised.”
In a separate interview with Vulture, Kidman revealed how emotionally drained she felt when filming finally wrapped each day.
“Afterward, I would just be quiet,” Kidman said. “I would go home and be quiet. After we shot some of the really, really violent scenes, I was in a lot of pain myself . . . It was very strange . . . It wasn’t a good feeling, I have to say. But women go through this, so I wanted to tap into the truth of it, and I wanted to be real in those scenes, so that’s what it required—an element of violence.”
“The way in which Jean-Marc shoots, where there’s so much documentary style to some of those things,” Kidman continued, explaining why she ended up going partially Method. “I feel weird talking about it . . . It’s probably one of the hardest roles I’ve had to talk about because I’m still very raw about it, if that makes any kind of sense. When I walked away from [the character], I remember thinking that was the deepest I’ve gone in terms of finding and losing things.”
