Nicole Kidman on Rabbit Hole and How the Oscars Changed Her Life

That kind of comfort is something your character, Becca, doesn't have. She goes through a number of emotions in the wake of her child's death -- rage, bitterness, guilt -- as does Aaron's character, but it's really about the two of them dealing with their grief separately, rather than together. How rare is it to find characters like this?

I don't get offered these kinds of roles, so that's probably why I developed it and was drawn to it. It's not something I get offered.

Why do you think that is? Do you think these kinds of roles just aren't written very often?

Maybe, except there are many great roles this year that are very complicated. I think I just don't get to see them. [Laughs] So I was just glad that we actually got the money to make this, because I think Becca is such a rich, complicated woman.

What was it about Becca that spoke to you most?

I love her -- I feel so much for her. And as much as she's abrasive at times and brittle, she's in enormous distress. I hope that that bleeds through in the performance; it was something I was constantly saying to John. "Are you sure you can feel me through this? Can you feel?" And he'd be like, "Yeah. Yeah, I can." Because so much of this film is about not showing it, and the grief manifesting in behavior that's just illogical. But I think David Lindsay-Abaire did a magnificent job of balancing her pain with her protection, and her barriers, and then the people who trigger that. Her mother is the trigger for so much, which tends to be very real. When I read it I thought, "This is so real."

And sitting in the kitchen at the end of the film, when they've both gone down different paths yet both of them have managed to come back and be there that morning, and it's like, "What do we do now?" I know that. Even the final image for me was one of the reasons to make the film. I just love that. Sitting there, two people who have been together for a long period of time and have now been dealt something absolutely devastating but they're still trying to stay together.

What sort of discussions did you have with Aaron about your characters and their interactions, their relationship, and those tense confrontation scenes?

We didn't discuss those, we just did them. We didn't rehearse them, either. We had about a week prior to shooting where we just sat around and talked and shared stories, and went through a back story for our marriage and when we met. That's really necessary to me; I don't know if it was totally necessary for Aaron, but he was up for it. We mapped it all out so that there was the history. And then physically we got used to touching each other -- because we were living in this house that we were shooting in, we were very close, in close confinement. You couldn't get away from each other, which was great for the film. But I think we both came having done our preparation, so it was more like John going, "Hold on to all this. Get easy with each other, but then let's just wait 'til we have a camera."

I love shooting like that, because then it's absolutely just coming out of you and there are no plans, no results, no trying to hit something. Even with the blocking, they shot it in a particular way where we didn't have to hit marks all the time. I like doing things differently a lot, so if I feel it I don't want to be trapped into some previous blocking. And that's a great way to work because the two of us have to listen to each other all the time so that we're responding to what's happening in the moment.

That's a much more liberating way to work as an actor. Was the shoot as improvisational in terms of dialogue?

No. Sometimes we'd improvise the end of scenes but basically it was written. What you see, David had written. And that's just good that you feel it has that kind of improvisational feeling because that means it seems very real.

Since it's that time of year and you're already garnering critics' award nominations for Rabbit Hole, let's talk Oscars. I went back and watched your Oscar speech from the year you won Best Actress for The Hours.

Oh no!

Do you remember the feeling of living through that moment?

Vaguely. It's kind of like a bit off in a dream. I wouldn't have a clue what I said; I've never watched it. I know that I left people out. My dad, who was there. I just didn't even thank him and he was sitting in the front row. It's just... [Sighs] And I loved my dad!

It was a very sweet speech. At the end of it, you dedicated it to your daughter Bella and to your mother. Given the connection that having Sunday Rose had with your performance, would you like her to look back on Rabbit Hole years from now in a similar way?

No, I wouldn't want her to. In some ways I feel like she might think it was strange, so I don't want her to associate [herself] with this film. I'll make a film for her, but this is not her film. I want to go and make a beautiful, yummy film for her. [Laughs]

How has the significance of the Academy Awards changed to you throughout your career, especially after winning an Oscar?

They're just as exciting -- if not more so -- as you get older because there's a sense of what it means, actually. Particularly in a lifetime of work, the pursuit of excellence is something that's important. And I think once you've got things to compare it to in terms of work that hasn't reached where you want it to reach or hasn't been acknowledged, and, you know, have certainly had failures... That contrast puts everything into a much sweeter spot.

And also, when I won the Oscar it was a very strange time for me. I was alone. I had the Oscar, but I didn't really have a life. So that was strange, and it was actually that which propelled me into going, "My God, I actually have to find who I am and what I am and what I actually want for the next 50 or 60 years of my life, if I live that long."

And how did you do that?

I started to really open myself up to finding someone to share my life with, which I think I'd been pretty close to prior to that.

[Top photo: Getty Images]

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