Nicole Kidman couldn’t film a scene for a heart-breaking reason – and it explains why she has her unusual relationship rule

She’s starred across every genre imaginable, playing everything from a singing courtesan in Paris to a woman living in a (seemingly) haunted house. But even Nicole Kidman still finds parts of the job overwhelming.

Nicole Kidman’s best looks over the years – plus her enviable CV – have all but guaranteed her status as one of the last true movie stars, but, as it turns out, the accomplished actress struggled with her latest series.

Nicole found it hard to film scenes depicting the loss of a child because she was deeply homesick, and she had been struggling maintaining her usual rule of not going more than two weeks without seeing her family.

Speaking to the Guardian about her role in Expats, the Big Little Lies star opened up about the role she was playing, and the scenes which left her feeling like a “donkey.”

In the series, she plays Margaret who loses her young son early on.

And it was a scene Nicole struggled with. She recalled, “I said, I cannot, cannot do this.’ It was like when a donkey just goes, ‘I’m not going.’”

She explained why she felt particularly vulnerable during shooting in Hong Kong.

“I was alone in Hong Kong without my family, which was a terrible mistake. I couldn’t just get on a plane and get to them. And they couldn’t get to me. That affected the performance, to the degree that it also affected my psyche.”

“But it was like the domestic violence storyline in Big Little Lies. I think: people go through this, my job is to be the conduit and perform it to its absolute authentic truth. And if I’m not doing that, then I’m not serving why I work as an actor, which is to artistically connect to the way life is, in all its pain and glory.”

Nicole being cut off from her family is against the Aussie’s unconventional but sweet rules when it comes to her marriage to country singer Keith Urban.

Not only do they plan their busy lives to never be apart longer than a small window of time, they actually don’t do a very common thing.

“We never ever text, can you believe that?” Nicole one revealed to podcast, Something to Talk About.

“We started out that way – I was like, 'If you want to get a hold of me, call me.’”

She continued, “I wasn't really a texter. I think he tried texting me a few times and I never texted back. Then it was like, this is quite nice. If you really want to get a hold of me, you have to call me. Everyone else we text with. That's just the one thing we don't do.”

In a later interview with a Brisbane radio station, Keith mentioned the oft-quoted “rule” the two of them considered when it comes to spending time apart.

The singer clarified, “We never made a promise to each other. I just don't want to be away from her for two weeks or [even] a week. We try and schedule pretty much everything so that we're not away from each other for more than a hand full of days.”

Expats, Nicole’s new drama, debuts on Prime Video on January 26.