{"id":290,"date":"2009-07-10T18:08:11","date_gmt":"2009-07-10T08:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sandralee.com.au\/?p=290"},"modified":"2009-07-12T12:37:50","modified_gmt":"2009-07-12T02:37:50","slug":"is-nicole-kidman-box-office-poison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/2009\/07\/is-nicole-kidman-box-office-poison\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Nicole Kidman box office poison?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Nicole<\/a>

Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman in Australia <\/p><\/div>\n

You’ve got to pity Academy Award<\/span><\/strong> winning actress Nicole Kidman<\/strong><\/span>. The 42-year-old actress has a permanent target on her chest and the latest to take aim is influential Hollywood <\/span><\/strong>reporter Nikki Finke<\/strong><\/span>.<\/p>\n

In her must-read DeadlineHollywoodDaily website<\/a>, Finke has attacked Kidman for daring to change her American publicist after a professional relationship that lasted 15 years.<\/p>\n

Hang on, isn’t that Kidman’s prerogative? After all, things change, we move on. It’s called life. And besides, she is still with her Australian publicist Wendy Day<\/strong><\/span>, who has been at her side through thick and thin for more than two decades, proving Kidman is more than loyal.<\/p>\n

But her decision to change PR agent has upset Finke, who\u00a0calls Kidman “box office poison” and says she “has zero charisma on screen; women don’t like her and men think she’s sexless”.<\/p>\n

Previously, other critics agreed. Recall how she unfairly copped a caning for her last film, the super-hyped Baz Luhrmann<\/strong><\/span>, Australia<\/strong><\/em><\/span>. Melanie Reid<\/strong><\/span> in The Times<\/span><\/strong><\/em> newspaper in London was scathing about her performance and said the director had made a “big, big mistake” in casting the lanky redhead.<\/p>\n

“Kidman is exquisitely accomplished at being awful. She can’t act,” Reid wrote. Meow!<\/p>\n

Even though others were less cruel – a Los Angeles Times <\/strong><\/em><\/span>reporter said she was not a movie star – you get the picture.<\/p>\n

Kidman arouses the critics, but is she really box office poison?<\/p>\n

Australia<\/em> might have earned mixed reviews but it still managed to pull in US$211 million at the international box office – which is not too shabby (that figure does not include important DVD sales.) Another critical dud, The Golden Compass<\/strong><\/span> <\/em>also did good business – so she’s got to be doing something right.<\/p>\n

Yes, Kidman has been in some shockers – The Invasion<\/strong><\/em><\/span>, anyone? – but I’m curious why she evokes such a strong, usually negative, reactions from so many people.<\/p>\n

I’ve met her and interviewed her a couple of times, the last being on the set of Australia<\/em> in outback Kununurra<\/strong><\/span>. I’m no apologist for her, and I’m not on her payroll, and I’ve been critical of the hype surrounding her and her ex-husband Tom Cruise in the past, but she’s pleasant, she’s sweet, she’s professional, she’s inoffensive and she genuinely wants to do a good job.<\/p>\n

It’s hard to muster up the fiercely negative feelings for her that Finke and others have. Folk might not instantly warm to Kidman, but she’s not an effusive\u00a0Labrador<\/strong><\/span> puppy bouncing around looking for instant friends. She’s a woman who admits to being painfully shy, as do most actors. And there is no denying her \u00a0talent – just look at the brilliant performance in To Die For<\/span><\/strong>. <\/em>Not every film is a winner and that’s true of all actors, even the incomparable Meryl Streep (Death Becomes Her)<\/em> and<\/span><\/span> Johnny Depp (the recently panned<\/span><\/span> Public Enemies)<\/em><\/span><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Still, for someone who is supposedly box office poison, Forbes <\/span><\/em><\/strong>magazine rated Kidman the eighth top earning actress in Hollywood last year with $15.7 million in income – that’s in Australian dollars.<\/p>\n

If that’s box office poison, I’d happily drink from the cup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You’ve got to pity Academy Award winning actress Nicole Kidman. The 42-year-old actress has a permanent target on her chest and the latest to take aim is influential Hollywood reporter Nikki Finke. In her must-read DeadlineHollywoodDaily website, Finke has attacked Kidman for daring to change her American publicist after a professional relationship that lasted 15 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,18,9,3,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-celebrity","category-film","category-media","category-pop-culture","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=290"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":305,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290\/revisions\/305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}