Nicole Mary Kidman is an Academy Award-winning actress, a UN Citizen of the World award winning humanitarian and a UNIFEM and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador.
Nicole Kidman was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, to Dr. Anthony David Kidman, who was involved with the labor movement and progressive causes, and Janelle Ann MacNeille, who edited her husband's books. Her mother is of Scottish descent and her father a descendant of an immigrant farmer. At the time she was born, her father was a cancer research specialist in Washington, D.C. The family returned to Australia when Kidman was four years old, when her father took on a lectureship at the University of Technology, Sydney. Kidman has a younger sister, Antonia, born in 1970. Kidman's parents and sister both reside in Greenwich, a suburb on Sydney's North Shore. Kidman, a Catholic, attended Mary Mackillop Chapel in North Sydney with her sister. Kidman started taking ballet lessons when she was four. This led to studies at Sydney's Australian Theatre for Young People, where she is now Patron, then at the Philip Street Theatre, where she majored in voice production and theatre history. Living in Longueville, New South Wales, she studied at North Sydney Girls High School, but dropped out when her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer; Kidman concentrated on her family responsibilities until her mother's recovery. Relationships Kidman met Tom Cruise on the set of their 1990 movie, Days of Thunder. Cruise was married to actress Mimi Rogers at the time, and later divorced her. Kidman and Cruise were married on Christmas Eve 1990 in Telluride, Colorado. The couple adopted two children, daughter Isabella Jane (b. December 22, 1993) and son Connor Anthony (b. January 17, 1995), and lived in Los Angeles, Australia, Colorado, and New York City. Cruise left Kidman while she was three months pregnant, just before their 10th wedding anniversary. She subsequently had a miscarriage. The marriage was dissolved in 2001. The reasons for the dissolution have never been made public. The 2003 film Cold Mountain was plagued by rumors that an on-set affair between Kidman and co-star Jude Law was responsible for the breakup of his marriage. Both vehemently denied the allegations, and Kidman eventually won an undisclosed sum from the British tabloids that pushed the story. She donated the money to a Romanian orphanage in the town where the movie was filmed. Shortly after her Oscar win, there were rumours of a relationship between her and fellow Oscar winner Adrien Brody. There was no confimation or denial. She met musician Lenny Kravitz in 2003 and dated him into 2004. Kidman met country singer Keith Urban at a Hollywood event honouring Australians in January 2005. Kidman and Urban were married on Sunday June 25, 2006, at the Cardinal Cerretti Memorial Chapel in the grounds of St Patrick's Estate, Manly in Sydney.