Nicole Kidman has opened up on the impact some of the “darker” roles she has played have had on her emotionally.
In a candid interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the 56-year-old Australian actress admitted there have been several moments where she doubted her sanity after taking on the psychology of her characters.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Nicole Kidman honoured with an American Film Institute Life Achievement Award.
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“After Expats, I went and did a comedy, because I went crazy with my own psychology,” she told the outlet.
“I was like, ‘this is unhealthy’.
“And I think it’s something that we need to talk about as actors — protecting your body so that you can live for as long as you are given on this earth.
“Because (acting in dark roles) is very tough on the psyche.”
In Expats, Kidman plays Margaret, a wealthy woman living in Hong Kong whose family is beset by tragedy when their youngest child goes missing.
She is also well-known for her role in the dark drama Big Little Lies, in which she plays Celeste Wright, a woman abused by her husband Perry (Alexander Skarsgard).
The confronting nature of the scenes she was enacting had some unexpected side-effects, she revealed.
“I threw a rock (through a window) because (a door) was locked and I couldn’t get in,” she said.
“I’d never done that in my life.
“I obviously had (a lot) pent up.
“I broke the whole thing. It cost a fortune.
“And then I went back the next day and I said to Alexander (Skarsgard) and Jean-Marc (Vallée): ‘I threw a rock through the window,’ and they were like: ‘Whoa …’
“I said: ‘I was kind of p***** off.’
“But there’s a way in which we operate where the show must go on, and so you just keep going — you show up and you do it and do it and do it and do it.
“And a lot of times, it’s six months of 12, 14-hour days and there really isn’t the time to go, ‘I need to take care of myself’.”
When she does have time to take care of herself, she said she enjoyed getting a massage or taking a hot bath, adding that physical touch was important.
“Even a pat on the back, just someone touching you and going, ‘it’s OK’,” she said.
Fortunately her home life with musician husband Keith Urban and their teenage daughters Sunday, 15, and Faith, 13, is a happy one.
Kidman also has two older children, Isabella, 31, and Connor, 29, from her first marriage to Tom Cruise.
The family splits its time between a home in Nashville, Tennessee, and a home in Sydney, but Kidman and Urban also have properties in Los Angeles, London and New York.
