Jark
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- Oct 27, 2007
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I mean, if Madame has her own appreciation lounge, I think the actual greatest actor of our times deserves at least a virtual chaise lounge. Although she'd probably prefer a wicker chair in a quiet corner of a barn on the ranch or something.
anyway, Nicole is starring in The Undoing on HBO premiering imminently, and she's done a new interview with the New York Times in which she goes quite in-depth talking to David Marchese on her methods, working with Kubrick and Tom on Eyes Wide Shut, and why she took certain roles among other topics - an essential read for any obsessive Kidmanite.
here it is more or less in full for anyone without access (split into two parts because it's SO excessively long)
anyway, Nicole is starring in The Undoing on HBO premiering imminently, and she's done a new interview with the New York Times in which she goes quite in-depth talking to David Marchese on her methods, working with Kubrick and Tom on Eyes Wide Shut, and why she took certain roles among other topics - an essential read for any obsessive Kidmanite.
here it is more or less in full for anyone without access (split into two parts because it's SO excessively long)
I love the relationship between a director and an actor. When it’s pure, it’s exquisite. And the other actors, when you’re all there doing the work, it’s exquisite.
Is it more exquisite than life outside acting?
It used to be. Probably changed mid-30s. I started working at 14. I had my first kiss onstage. I was living out my life artistically.
Did you realize at some point that living your life through your work was possibly unhealthy?
I don’t know if it was unhealthy.
But it might raise the question of where you thought real life was happening.
I don’t know. Do you believe in the parallel universes? I’ve just seen “Tenet.” [Laughs.] If there was a choice, I don’t know I would be an actor. But its pull is so powerful that it’s not a choice. But, gosh, what is reality? The idea of not being present for my children and not being here for my loved ones is devastating. And, on my deathbed, the idea of drifting off into another realm is scary. [Laughs.]
When you were talking about your attitude toward your work when you were younger —
The labels and exact timing, that gets too logical. It’s not like, “Right here is when it all changed.” The essence of who you are evolves. You implied, well, life is obviously more important than the work, than artistic life, and I was like, is it? I was being provocative with you. The deepest part of being a human for me is the connections. Because that’s what you’re left with. I was watching Philip Seymour Hoffman [in 'The Master'] the other day, and I went, “Thank you for your work.” I watch different actors and films, it’s gut-wrenchingly beautiful. Watching Pacino in “The Godfather.” Looking at what Kubrick left us to ponder. It makes me cry because it’s an offering that goes beyond a life.
You’ve mentioned Kubrick a couple of times now. It’s obvious that working with him on “Eyes Wide Shut” was important for you. But I’ve been wondering about the total immersion and the personal psychological analysis that he asked of you and Tom Cruise as a couple for that film. At any point, in the middle of that, were you at all like, “This is a weird thing we’re doing”?
No. This is where the fallacy is: We loved working with him. We shot that for two years. We had two kids and were living in a trailer on the lot primarily, making spaghetti because Stanley liked to eat with us sometimes. We were working with the greatest filmmaker and learning about our lives and enjoying our lives on set. We would say, “When is it going to end?” We went over there thinking it was going to be three months. It turned into a year, a year and a half.
But you go, As long as I surrender to what this is, I’m going to have an incredible time. Stanley, he wasn’t torturous. He was arduous in that he would shoot a lot. But I’d sit on the floor of his office and talk, and we’d watch animal videos. He said animals were so much nicer than human beings. Though I do remember we were watching a wildlife thing where you saw the lion going after an antelope, and he could hardly watch it. Interesting, isn’t it?
You know how in “Eyes Wide Shut” you have that monologue in which your character is talking about infidelity and says to Tom’s character, “I was ready to give up everything”? That speech is all about emasculation and emotional aggression. If you’re acting those scenes with the person to whom you’re married, and doing it as part of this immersive process, can it open up negative feelings that later you maybe wish you hadn’t opened?
That fits the narrative that people came up with, but I definitely didn’t see it like that. We were happily married through that. We would go go-kart racing after those scenes. We’d rent out a place and go racing at 3 in the morning. I don’t know what else to say. Maybe I don’t have the ability to look back and dissect it. Or I’m not willing to.
What satisfaction does acting give you now?
It’s the strangest thing: A lot of people as they get older get more protected and terrified. My desire is to keep throwing myself into things. My parenting, my relationship, my work. I’ll take the pain. I’ll take the joy. Because the feeling makes me go, I’m in life. It’s an enormous gift, this life. My ability to love is so deep. My love for my children and for my mother, who’s 80 years old, and my desire to not lose her. You know, I was at her house last weekend and she pulled out a CD of my father singing. It was like being stabbed in the gut. My mother said, “I can’t listen to it,” and I went, “I can. I have to. I get why you can’t, Mama, but I want to.” Most people would turn it off. I left it on.
I’ve read you say before that you’re looking for risk in the roles you take. What felt risky about Grace Fraser? I’m not sure if I’ve said "risk". That might have been attributed to me and not come out of my mouth. I’ve pushed myself into places that I don’t find comfortable. I’m interested in philosophy and the human psyche. I’m interested in stoicism. “Risk” feels superficial. It’s more about the stories and the ways in which I get to explore the psychology of who we are as people.
Are you interested in stoicism as a quality in which you’re maybe lacking?
Probably. Stoicism would help me survive. Particularly for me having a mother who’s — I’m dealing right now with a mother who’s struggling. Mortality is very present — and pain. So how do you survive? How do you respond? I have the power to choose how I respond. You’ve reduced me to tears!
Hopefully for the right reasons.
Yeah. Yeah. I am dealing with family right now, my life, and that all comes into play.
How did you used to think about balancing trying to do roles that allowed for a range of expression — the kind of roles you do now — with taking less complex roles that, for career reasons, you probably felt compelled to take?
I came from an industry that’s small and was fighting to survive — the Australian film industry. My whole attitude was get out there and work. There’s no chance of being selective because you’ve got to make money. I didn’t come from an affluent family. It was always about being a working actor. Then I got taken under the umbrella of a company called Kennedy Miller. They did a series here on the Vietnam War and the way that impacted Australia. I played a conscientious objector, and that was my beginning of getting to do the things that I’m interested in: dissect a character and have a great arc and work with talented people. Then I fell in love and came to the States. Things were jagged. As I’ve gotten older, I do get to make choices and have some say in my trajectory as an artist. What an extraordinary thing.
I wonder if that answer betrayed some knee-jerk Australian humility. You said you just wanted to work, but I suspect there was always more to it than that.
Now I have some control. There was a period of time when it was hard to even get a role. I’m talking over a decade ago when people were like, [snaps fingers] “That’s the age cutoff.” That’s when I produced “Rabbit Hole.” That was an amazing thing because I’d gotten married and was about to have my baby, and was going, OK, it’s not that satisfying career-wise. It was like a wall had been put around me. Part of the reason so many of us want to produce is because then we can have more say in where we end up.
That age cutoff presumably had something to do with other people’s perceptions about sexual desirability. What does it do to your head — as a person, let alone an actress — to have to face that? There aren’t many jobs where it’s so explicit that you can get dropped for a younger model.
You’re not told it directly. You have to read between the lines. I suppose part of my naïveté is that I didn’t think of it like that. I thought, Oh, people are just sick of you. That’s my Australianism, like you said. But as an actor, being attached to your face and body and the form of it is not going to bode well if you’re looking for a long career where you embody different people.
Is it more exquisite than life outside acting?
It used to be. Probably changed mid-30s. I started working at 14. I had my first kiss onstage. I was living out my life artistically.
Did you realize at some point that living your life through your work was possibly unhealthy?
I don’t know if it was unhealthy.
But it might raise the question of where you thought real life was happening.
I don’t know. Do you believe in the parallel universes? I’ve just seen “Tenet.” [Laughs.] If there was a choice, I don’t know I would be an actor. But its pull is so powerful that it’s not a choice. But, gosh, what is reality? The idea of not being present for my children and not being here for my loved ones is devastating. And, on my deathbed, the idea of drifting off into another realm is scary. [Laughs.]
When you were talking about your attitude toward your work when you were younger —
The labels and exact timing, that gets too logical. It’s not like, “Right here is when it all changed.” The essence of who you are evolves. You implied, well, life is obviously more important than the work, than artistic life, and I was like, is it? I was being provocative with you. The deepest part of being a human for me is the connections. Because that’s what you’re left with. I was watching Philip Seymour Hoffman [in 'The Master'] the other day, and I went, “Thank you for your work.” I watch different actors and films, it’s gut-wrenchingly beautiful. Watching Pacino in “The Godfather.” Looking at what Kubrick left us to ponder. It makes me cry because it’s an offering that goes beyond a life.
You’ve mentioned Kubrick a couple of times now. It’s obvious that working with him on “Eyes Wide Shut” was important for you. But I’ve been wondering about the total immersion and the personal psychological analysis that he asked of you and Tom Cruise as a couple for that film. At any point, in the middle of that, were you at all like, “This is a weird thing we’re doing”?
No. This is where the fallacy is: We loved working with him. We shot that for two years. We had two kids and were living in a trailer on the lot primarily, making spaghetti because Stanley liked to eat with us sometimes. We were working with the greatest filmmaker and learning about our lives and enjoying our lives on set. We would say, “When is it going to end?” We went over there thinking it was going to be three months. It turned into a year, a year and a half.
But you go, As long as I surrender to what this is, I’m going to have an incredible time. Stanley, he wasn’t torturous. He was arduous in that he would shoot a lot. But I’d sit on the floor of his office and talk, and we’d watch animal videos. He said animals were so much nicer than human beings. Though I do remember we were watching a wildlife thing where you saw the lion going after an antelope, and he could hardly watch it. Interesting, isn’t it?
You know how in “Eyes Wide Shut” you have that monologue in which your character is talking about infidelity and says to Tom’s character, “I was ready to give up everything”? That speech is all about emasculation and emotional aggression. If you’re acting those scenes with the person to whom you’re married, and doing it as part of this immersive process, can it open up negative feelings that later you maybe wish you hadn’t opened?
That fits the narrative that people came up with, but I definitely didn’t see it like that. We were happily married through that. We would go go-kart racing after those scenes. We’d rent out a place and go racing at 3 in the morning. I don’t know what else to say. Maybe I don’t have the ability to look back and dissect it. Or I’m not willing to.
What satisfaction does acting give you now?
It’s the strangest thing: A lot of people as they get older get more protected and terrified. My desire is to keep throwing myself into things. My parenting, my relationship, my work. I’ll take the pain. I’ll take the joy. Because the feeling makes me go, I’m in life. It’s an enormous gift, this life. My ability to love is so deep. My love for my children and for my mother, who’s 80 years old, and my desire to not lose her. You know, I was at her house last weekend and she pulled out a CD of my father singing. It was like being stabbed in the gut. My mother said, “I can’t listen to it,” and I went, “I can. I have to. I get why you can’t, Mama, but I want to.” Most people would turn it off. I left it on.
I’ve read you say before that you’re looking for risk in the roles you take. What felt risky about Grace Fraser? I’m not sure if I’ve said "risk". That might have been attributed to me and not come out of my mouth. I’ve pushed myself into places that I don’t find comfortable. I’m interested in philosophy and the human psyche. I’m interested in stoicism. “Risk” feels superficial. It’s more about the stories and the ways in which I get to explore the psychology of who we are as people.
Are you interested in stoicism as a quality in which you’re maybe lacking?
Probably. Stoicism would help me survive. Particularly for me having a mother who’s — I’m dealing right now with a mother who’s struggling. Mortality is very present — and pain. So how do you survive? How do you respond? I have the power to choose how I respond. You’ve reduced me to tears!
Hopefully for the right reasons.
Yeah. Yeah. I am dealing with family right now, my life, and that all comes into play.
How did you used to think about balancing trying to do roles that allowed for a range of expression — the kind of roles you do now — with taking less complex roles that, for career reasons, you probably felt compelled to take?
I came from an industry that’s small and was fighting to survive — the Australian film industry. My whole attitude was get out there and work. There’s no chance of being selective because you’ve got to make money. I didn’t come from an affluent family. It was always about being a working actor. Then I got taken under the umbrella of a company called Kennedy Miller. They did a series here on the Vietnam War and the way that impacted Australia. I played a conscientious objector, and that was my beginning of getting to do the things that I’m interested in: dissect a character and have a great arc and work with talented people. Then I fell in love and came to the States. Things were jagged. As I’ve gotten older, I do get to make choices and have some say in my trajectory as an artist. What an extraordinary thing.
I wonder if that answer betrayed some knee-jerk Australian humility. You said you just wanted to work, but I suspect there was always more to it than that.
Now I have some control. There was a period of time when it was hard to even get a role. I’m talking over a decade ago when people were like, [snaps fingers] “That’s the age cutoff.” That’s when I produced “Rabbit Hole.” That was an amazing thing because I’d gotten married and was about to have my baby, and was going, OK, it’s not that satisfying career-wise. It was like a wall had been put around me. Part of the reason so many of us want to produce is because then we can have more say in where we end up.
That age cutoff presumably had something to do with other people’s perceptions about sexual desirability. What does it do to your head — as a person, let alone an actress — to have to face that? There aren’t many jobs where it’s so explicit that you can get dropped for a younger model.
You’re not told it directly. You have to read between the lines. I suppose part of my naïveté is that I didn’t think of it like that. I thought, Oh, people are just sick of you. That’s my Australianism, like you said. But as an actor, being attached to your face and body and the form of it is not going to bode well if you’re looking for a long career where you embody different people.