“Heightened reality”: Nicole Kidman on the most “over-the-top” performance of her career
While we sit around and wait not very patiently for Matt Reeves to get on with finishing The Batman Part II with Robert Pattinson, it’s worth remembering how far the Caped Crusader has come in 30 years since the slightly strange world of Batman Forever starring Nicole Kidman.
It was the third movie after Tim Burton’s reboot back in 1989 with Michael Keaton as Bruce Wayne, and thanks to the success of that film and the sequel Batman Returns three years later, hopes were high for Joel Schumacher’s big-budget effort.
Kidman was just one of the star names brought in at huge expense by Warner Bros alongside Jim Carrey, who was probably the biggest comedy star in the world at the time, Tommy Lee Jones, and Val Kilmer as Batman himself. Schumacher played a key part in bringing her on to the film to play the criminal psychiatrist Dr Chase Meridian, despite knowing she was impossibly glamorous, explaining simply, “It’s my Gotham City, and I can do what I want.”
The Australian actor certainly had the celebrity power to bring people in at the cinemas – she was married to Tom Cruise back then after starring with him in Days of Thunder and Far and Away, and she had just given a jaw-dropping performance in To Die For, the black comedy featuring a young Joaquin Phoenix, for which she’d scooped a Golden Globe for ‘Best Actress’.
Batman Forever was an enormous undertaking, with a budget of more than $100million it was a summer blockbuster that saw Batman take on not one, but two foes in the shape of Two-Face and The Riddler, and Kidman was tasked with distracting him, something she revelled in doing.
Talking to Entertainment Weekly at the time, she said, “She’s constantly trying to seduce him. She wears black slinky dresses, has perfect hair, perfect red lips, and talks in a deep, husky voice. It’s definitely a heightened reality. Really over-the-top.”
The film itself seemed to be caught between the high camp of the Adam West TV show of the 1960s and the darker tones that Burton had struck with his first two movies. Carrey was his usual maniacal self, leading Tommy Lee Jones to tell him he hated him, and reviews were decidedly mixed, but it wasn’t enough to stop people flocking to cinemas to get their Batman fill. It had the highest opening box office weekend of any movie in history, beating Jurassic Park, and was the second most successful film of 1995, behind Toy Story.
Kidman was more than happy with the film, telling the press she did it solely because she got to kiss Batman, and getting to appear in Gotham City after she’d just missed out on a part as Catwoman in the second film to Michelle Pfeiffer. Her career continued to thrive after the movie was released, having huge hits with titles like The Peacemaker with George Clooney, Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut, again with Cruise in 1999, and then 2001’s Moulin Rouge, for which she got the first of her five Academy Award nominations.
After focusing on TV in recent years to great effect with shows like Big Little Lies, Nine Perfect Strangers and Scarpetta, she’s going to be back on the big screen later this year with a sequel to another hit ‘90s franchise, Practical Magic 2. The first film saw Kidman and Sandra Bullock as witches and sisters who use their powers to battle an abusive boyfriend.
