June 8, 2004

It's all an act

By Donna Freydkin, USA Today

NEW YORK — Here's exactly how much Nicole Kidman and Matthew Broderick, who play sparring spouses in the new version of The Stepford Wives, dislike each other in real life.

They will be co-starring together again. In another remake. And it's all at Broderick's behest.

While shooting a Stepford driving scene last year, Broderick asked Kidman to join him in the new big-screen version of The Producers as sexy secretary Ulla. She said yes. Right away. On the spot.

But Broderick, who starred in The Producers on Broadway, isn't holding his breath. "She's gonna drop out," jokes the actor, 43, sedate in a dark suit.

Kidman, 36, dainty in a vintage 1920s flowered frock, doesn't miss a beat during their joint interview in a deluxe suite at the Essex House hotel. "You want to make a bet on that? I'm lucky to have the role."

And both hope that lady luck smiles on their current co-production, The Stepford Wives, which cost a reported $90 million and hits theaters Friday. The remake — featuring re-shot scenes and an ending different from the original's — is a darkly comic revisitation of the 1975 cult classic about suburban husbands who transform their wives into curvy, compliant robots. This time, Kidman's power-hungry network executive Joanna Eberhart gets fired, suffers a nervous breakdown and moves to the perfectly manicured town of Stepford with her husband and two kids in search of marital bliss and suburban harmony.

To hear Kidman and Broderick tell it, harmonious pretty much sums up their working relationship. They have an easy, breezy banter that dates to their first meeting nearly a decade ago, when Broderick appeared in the San Diego stage version of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. "You were so very nervous," recalls Kidman, who met him during his run.

"I was so frightened. You were nice; I remember that," Broderick says.

Kidman laughs. "Oh, thank God!"

The two got on equally well this time and according to Broderick, "never ever had any fights."

"Ever!" Kidman exclaims. Which is what makes those pesky rumors about all-consuming Stepford strife "so weird."

Of course, it's generally mandatory for actors, especially those promoting a big and potentially troubled summer movie, to sing each other's praises. Kidman, for one, calls Broderick "very easygoing," thanks to his "great, great dry sense of humor that can lift you up."

Broderick returns the plaudits. He was shocked by Kidman's "down-to-earth-ness. I guess because I believe everything I read," he adds, turning to her. "Your image — I didn't know how you'd be. She can be one of the guys. She's very pleasant to be around. It was a hard thing sometimes, and we all stuck together."

A complicated shoot

Hard because, if you believe everything you read, the drawn-out shoot, which took place in New York City and Connecticut last summer, was plagued by verbal brawls and star-worthy temper tantrums. Last spring, John Cusack dropped out of the film, citing personal reasons, and Broderick replaced him as Kidman's kindly husband. And Bette Midler stepped in for Joan Cusack, who stepped out as Kidman's bawdy pal Bobbie Markowitz. Neither Kidman nor Broderick will cop to any of the reported arguments that erupted among the high-voltage cast, especially between Midler, Christopher Walken and director Frank Oz. Broderick does call the whole production "long" and "complicated."

How, exactly?

"It took a long time for everyone to get ready," Kidman says, referring to the elaborate ballroom dancing and aerobic workout scenes she shot.

But, she adds, "there was no one person who didn't fit in, which was unusual in a cast this big."

According to Kidman, they passed the time playing poker and Rummy 500. And they ate. "We all congregated around the (catering) table," says Kidman, who consumed "cereal. I love cereal. Honey Nut Cheerios."

Broderick concurs. "You ate berries as I ate fatty snacks."

The cast also worked through last year's blackout. Here is how one of Hollywood's most glam stars deals with a power outage amid blistering summer heat: "I ate Chinese food in the foyer of the hotel on the floor with the other guests. Cold Chinese food," Kidman says.

And Kidman says she's equally low-maintenance in everyday life.

"I rent places in different cities around the world," she says. "I move all my stuff. I'm very good now. I pack and move everything I own. I've greatly reduced what I own. It's quite a good feeling to be able to put everything in a suitcase and move it."

She's certainly keeping busy. Kidman next plays Samantha in the film adaptation of Bewitched and is slated to start shooting The Producers next year. Both she and Broderick can picture following their Stepford characters' leads — leaving downtown New York, where both have homes, and relocating to suburbia.

Suburbia looks good at times

"Sometimes I think that would be nice. Quiet. The kids can run around and not be watched all the time," says Broderick, who has a son, James, 1, with his wife, Sarah Jessica Parker. "I never have before but I start to think, 'Wow, I am going to end up in one of these suburban places.' "

But not one quite like Stepford. The actor, born and bred in New York, shudders almost imperceptibly. "It's creepy, this idea of a perfect town and everybody the same. That's why the original was a horror movie," he says. "If you don't happen to fit into the mold of what everyone wants you to be, you're in terrible trouble."

Raising a celebrity baby in Manhattan, says Broderick, is a struggle, as photographers wait outside his brownstone and take pictures of his toddler. "You go to the park, and there's a photographer, and the other kids see that and the other parents, and you're already isolated," he sighs. "You can't keep a child indoors. He keeps saying, ' 'side, 'side, 'side.' "

Kidman, who has two children (Isabella, 11, and Conor, 9) with Tom Cruise, can relate. The Aussie actress says she's most at peace when visiting her parents in suburban Sydney. And city living, she adds, is slightly freaking out her sister Antonia, who accompanied her to the Tonys Sunday night, and Antonia's jet-lagged daughter Lucia, 5. "She's up at 3 a.m., and you can't go out for a walk, and she's running around the apartment," Kidman reports. "And we're eating cereal. Motherhood! The glamour of it all!"

What's even less fabulous is a typical night in the current life of Kidman, a voracious reader who's consuming The Bastard on the Couch, a collection of essays by men about what they desire from and detest about relationships.

Men are still a mystery

"My sister and I were sitting up in bed last night, because I have a really exciting life," she says, laughing, "and we were reading chapters from it. It's like, 'My gosh, they really think like that?' "

Kidman, who's famously divorced from superstar Cruise and has been linked to rocker Lenny Kravitz, says that when it comes to men, she'd never go for a yes-man programmed to please her at all times, like a Stepford wife.

"I don't want perfect. I like all of the flaws, and I like discovering all of the things that go into making up a complicated, interesting person who can keep me fascinated. Perfect? I'd be bored."

Broderick, too, prefers flaws to flawless. "I've never been attracted to that type, anyway. I've always liked challenging," he says.

Says Kidman: "You've got a great girl. Smart and funny and complicated, I'm sure."

Broderick nods his assent. But his wife, he admits, would change a few things about him if she could re-program his brain. "She would probably say that I don't make decisions quickly enough, that I procrastinate, that I'm slow. She'd probably want me to be more decisive," he says.

Sometimes that indecisiveness works in his favor. After all, it's a line of Broderick's that earned one of the film's biggest laughs during one media screening. In one scene, he genially calls Kidman's character a "castrating Manhattan career bitch."

Broderick laughs and shakes his head. "The line I hated and kept wanting to cut. And then I saw the movie, and it got a nice laugh. And I was like, 'Well, thank God that's there.' "