Big Little Lies proved that Nicole Kidman can masterfully play a tortured character, but this might just be the first time she actually looks the part. A photo of the actress from her upcoming movie Destroyer is sure to prompt some serious double-takes, since we've never seen her looking anything other than stunning. However, director Karyn Kusama was purposeful in her decision to have the character, an LAPD cop named Erin Bell, show "her ugliness on the outside."
“We always knew that what we wanted her to look like was a real middle-aged woman with a past that she wears on her face,” the director told Vanity Fair. "With sun damage and sleep deprivation and stress and rage, just in her whole physical body."
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Kidman's character is recovering from trauma 20 years after working undercover in a criminal gang. The experience is something that still haunts her, and you can see it in her face. But we're not talking about anything too crazy.
“Ironically, [Kidman] also hates being in the makeup chair,” Kusama said. “She just wants to be on set working. So we had to make it as short an application as possible.”
Kidman is joined by co-stars Tatiana Maslany, Bradley Whitford, and Sebastian Stan, who perhaps play the people from her character's past who resurface in her life. We'll know more when the film hits cinemas this December in the US with a UK release to be confirmed — because what does that picture scream if not "Happy Holidays"?