Nicole Kidman

While Nicole Kidman is famous as Australia’s first actress to take home an Oscarâ, the svelte beauty was actually born in Hawaii on June 20, 1967. Of Irish descent, the strawberry blonde came from parents who worried about her potential for success as an actress—despite her obvious talent. Her leggy figure pegs her height close to six feet; a fact that her parents were concerned would see her towering over her leading men. Their fears would be partially realized when she starred opposite Tom Cruise in two of the films most responsible for her break into stardom—Days of Thunder and Far and Away.

Nicole Kidman’s professional association with Cruise turned personal, when the couple married in 1990, between her two early Cruise-collaborations. Her dedication to storytelling and dramatic arts stems from a very active childhood, where she was encouraged by her parents to study journalism, keep a diary and practice writing—as well as receiving laudatory comments and letter from older actors. A famously courageous woman (she has a strong interest in skydiving), Nicole took the plunge and—on the strength of several notable appearances on Australian television—moved to Hollywood to star in 1989’s Dead Calm.

Nicole Kidman got her first crack at more complicated roles when controversial auteur Gus Van Sant saw her as the perfect choice to play the murderous, manipulative housewife in the 1995 film To Die For. This was followed the next year by an adaptation of the Henry James novel The Portrait of a Lady, and by then critics and filmmakers knew where to turn to for a fascinating performance from a blond bombshell.

Continuing to work with exciting directors such as Stanley Kubrick and Baz Luhrmann, Nicole Kidman finally got recognition from that notoriously fickle fellow Oscarâ following her portrayal of real life author Virginia Woolf in the 2003 film The Hours. The role required her to alter her appearance and voice, and balance humanism and humor with the heavy themes of death and depression.

She divorced Tom Cruise in 2001, citing the couple’s frenetic work pace, and after years of turning heads in her return to high heels (Tom Cruise stands several inches below Nicole) Nicole Kidman is now happily married to country singer Keith Urban.