Nicole Kidman reflects on marriage to Tom Cruise while filming Eyes Wide Shut: ‘We’d go go-kart racing at 3am’

‘Maybe I don’t have the ability to look back and dissect it. Or I’m not willing to’

Nicole Kidman has opened up about her time being married to Tom Cruise while filming Eyes Wide Shut together.

The pair, who divorced in 2001, co-starred as an infidelity-stricken married couple in Stanley Kubrick’s 1999 drama.

Speaking to the New York Times, Kidman was asked if the role opened up “negative feelings” about their marriage at the time.

The actor responded: “That fits the narrative that people came up with, but I definitely didn’t see it like that. We were happily married.”

"We would go go-kart racing after those scenes,’’ revealed Kidman. “We’d rent out a place and go racing at three 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.”

In the interview, Kidman was also effusive in her praise of the late 2001: A Space Odyssey filmmaker Kubrick.

Describing the way in which Eyes Wide Shut’s sex scene was shot, Kidman said: “When I went to work with Stanley Kubrick, he was like, ‘I’m going to want full frontal nudity’, and I was like, ‘Ahh, I don’t know.’ 

Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise at the world premiere of 'Eyes Wide Shut' in 1999 (AFP via Getty Images)

“So we came up with a great agreement, which was contractual. He would show me the scenes with the nudity before they made it into the film. Then I could feel completely safe. I didn’t say no to any of it. I’d wanted to make sure that it wasn’t going to be me standing there nude and everyone laughing at me.”

Kidman added that she was “protected”, and was able to “explore a complicated marriage” between the two film’s lead characters.

“I would never think of not wanting the storytelling to be told properly,” she continued. “Having them say, ‘Once you’re OK with it, great, that’s it’ – what a fantastic place to be in as a woman. Please write that correctly, because otherwise, it will be misinterpreted.”