English Yes! #1

Nicole Kidman (Australian Accent) talks about the movie Moulin Rouge, and about the challenge of in a musical.

     When I got the role I just was absolutely floored. I was so excited to get a role where you actually get to have the possibility of doing something so unusual, working with Ewan McGregor, working with Baz, filming in Sydney.

     This extraordinary character, or what he was going to try and achieve with this character. And I just remember going “Oh! This is like such a gift.” And then the reality of playing it set in, ‘cause when we got to Sydney, it was like “Ok! Now we’re just going to do a readthrough.” 

     But, with a readthrough on a musical, you’re not just reading lines, you’ve got to sing and you’ve got to sing unaccompanied and you hope you’re in the right key and it’s very, very confronting and it leaves you feeling very exposed. 

     But that’s what’s brilliant about Baz, is he actually pushes you early on in the piece so that, by the time you start to film, you’re so comfortable with what you’re doing, you’re ready to try anything and do anything. And Ewan and I sat down in sort of the first two days of the initial workshop, which was a two-week workshop in March, and we just looked at each other and we said, “We have got to be willing to make complete and utter fools of ourselves in front of each other, at  any time, and we also have to kind of help each other through this because it’s going to be a long road and he’s going to really push us at times and we’re no good and all of that stuff and let’s really be great mates. 

     And it was like going back to drama school, ‘cause we had singing class, dance class, then we’d have coffee break, and then we’d be off to do improvisational stuff. I mean, and we all lived in this big house, Iona, which is in Darlinghurst in

Sydney. They had all the other actors there. It was drama school!