Nicole Kidman

Nicole Mary Kidman, AC (born 20 June 1967) is an American-born Australian actress, fashion model, singer and humanitarian. In 2006, Kidman was made a Companion of the Order of Australia, Australia's highest civilian honour. In 2006, she was also the highest-paid actress in the motion picture industry.

Kidman's breakthrough was in the 1989 thriller Dead Calm. Her performances in films such as Days Of Thunder (1990), To Die For (1995) and Moulin Rouge! (2001) won her critical acclaim, and her performance in The Hours (2002) was acknowledged with several notable film awards including the Academy Award for Best Actress, a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe Award. In 2003, Kidman received her star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California.

She is also known for her marriage to Tom Cruise and her current marriage to country musician Keith Urban.

As a result of being born to Australian parents in Hawaii, Kidman has dual citizenship of Australia and the United States.

Early life:
Kidman was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. Her father, Dr Antony David Kidman, is a biochemist, clinical psychologist and author, with an office in Lane Cove, Sydney, Australia. Her mother, Janelle Ann (née Glenny), is a nursing instructor who edits her husband's books and was a member of the Women's Electoral Lobby. At the time of Kidman's birth, her father was a visiting fellow at the National Institute of Mental Health of the United States. The family returned to Australia when Kidman was four and her parents now live on Sydney's North Shore. Kidman has a younger sister, Antonia Kidman, a journalist. She has known actress Naomi Watts since they were in their teens and the two remain best friends today.

Kidman attended Lane Cove Public School and North Sydney Girls' High School. She studied at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne, and at the Phillip Street Theatre in Sydney, with Naomi Watts. This was followed by attending the Australian Theatre for Young People.

Personal life:
Kidman has been married twice. She became romantically involved with actor Tom Cruise on the set of their 1990 movie, Days of Thunder. Kidman and Cruise were married on Christmas Eve 1990 in Telluride, Colorado. The couple adopted a daughter, Isabella Jane (born 1992), and a son, Connor Anthony (born 1995). They separated just after their 10th wedding anniversary. She was three months pregnant and had a miscarriage. Cruise filed for divorce in February 2001. The marriage was dissolved in 2001, Cruise citing irreconcilable differences. The reasons for dissolution have never been made public. In Marie Claire, Kidman said she had an ectopic pregnancy early in their marriage. In the June 2006 Ladies' Home Journal, she said she still loved Cruise: "He was huge; still is. To me, he was just Tom, but to everybody else, he is huge. But he was lovely to me. And I loved him. I still love him." In addition, she has expressed shock about their divorce.

The 2003 film Cold Mountain brought rumours that an affair between Kidman and co-star Jude Law was responsible for the break-up of his marriage. Both denied the allegations, and Kidman won an undisclosed sum from the British tabloids that published the story. She gave the money to a Romanian orphanage in the town where the movie was filmed. Robbie Williams confirmed they had a short romance on her yacht in summer 2004. Shortly after her Oscar, there were rumours of a relationship between her and Adrien Brody. She met musician Lenny Kravitz in 2003 and dated him into 2004.

Kidman met her second husband, country singer Keith Urban at G'Day LA, an event honouring Australians in January 2005. They married on 25 June 2006, at Cardinal Cerretti Memorial Chapel in the grounds of St Patrick's Estate, Manly in Sydney. They maintain homes in Sydney, Sutton Forest, Los Angeles and Nashville, Tennessee. In March 2008, they bought mansions in Los Angelesand Nashville within days.

After speculation by the press, it was confirmed on 8 January 2008 that Kidman was three months pregnant. The couple had their first child, Sunday Rose Kidman Urban, on 7 July 2008, in Nashville, Tennessee. Kidman's father said the daughter's middle name was after Urban's late grandmother, Rose. Kidman mentioned in an interview with Ellen Degeneres in 2005 that she is banned from doing one of her favourite hobbies - sky diving - whilst shooting a movie. In January 2005, Kidman won interim restraining orders against two Sydney paparazzi who were stalking her.

In the beginning of 2009, Kidman appeared in a series of special edition postage stamps featuring some of Australia's great actors. She, Geoffrey Rush, Russell Crowe, and Cate Blanchett each appear twice in the series: once as themselves and once as their Academy Award-winning character.