Breaking Baz @ Cannes: Nicole Kidman, 'The Barefoot Queen Of Cannes', Wanted To Party On The Beach But Had To Fly Home For Her Kids' Exams
One can only marvel at Nicole Kidman's astuteness. The actress and producer wanted to know where I was scooting off to after the Kering/Festival de Cannes Women in Motion dinner Sunday night. When I started to tell her about the afterparty for Akinola Davies Jr's My Father's Shadow, her eyes lit up.
'That's one of the hits of the festival, right? First-time director, shot in Nigeria, right?'
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Kidman then proceeded to quiz me about the movie and the filmmaker siblings Akinola and Wale Davies, who penned the script together.
She would've loved the party on the beach thrown jointly for My Father's Shadow and Harry Lighton's biker romance Pillion.
During his presentation to Kidman, Cannes fest chief Thierry Frémaux hailed her as the 'Barefoot Queen of Cannes' because of her propensity to whip off her heels whenever possible. 'Yeah, but you're not allowed to do that now,' she observed to me later.
'But I'm OK with the 'Barefoot Queen of Cannes' label because I'm a rebel — always have been and always will be,' she declared.
She'd have been more than welcome to go dancing barefoot with Akinola and his gang.
Alas, it wasn't to be. After posing with fellow Women in Motion honoree Marianna Brennand — garlanded for her film Manas, about acts of incest in a remote part of the Amazon basin in Brazil — Kidman told me that she had to get back to 'my daughters' Sunday Rose and Faith Margaret in Nashville to help with their exams.
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Then it's on to Practical Magic 2 with director Susanne Bier starring Sandra Bullock and Kidman, and produced by them and Denise Di Novi. 'We continue on,' she explained, some 27 years after the original story of cursed witches was released.
Kidman noted the significance of having 'a woman' direct the sequel after Griffin Dunne shot the 1998 pic.
She has 'some things circulating, but I haven't decided yet' what to follow Practical Magic 2 with.
Returning to the stage is something that's on her to-do list. 'My kids are growing up, so it gives me a freer hand. They're much more willing to travel. … It's very hard to do theater when you have kids in school. They're 14 and turning 17,' noting that Sunday Rose will be headed to college the year after next.
The Oscar-winning artist last trod the boards 10 years ago, portraying DNA pioneer scientist Rosalind Franklin in Anna Ziegler's play Photograph 51, directed by Michael Grandage.
Natalie Portman will portray Franklin in a screen version of Photograph 51 directed by Tom Hooper. Over the coming weeks and months, Kidman said that she'll catch up with many of the films screened in Cannes citing the aforementioned My Father's Shadow; Lynne Ramsay's electrifying Die My Love, starring an unbelievably sublime Jennifer Lawrence opposite Robert Pattinson; Mascha Schilinski's Sound of Falling; and, of course, she's eager to see Urchin, directed by her Babygirl co-star Harris Dickinson. 'There's been no time to see it,' she lamented. 'I sent Harris a text about it.'
Kidman's acceptance speech was spot-on about not just wanting to work with women directors but also women writers, cinematographers and other heads of department. It was instructive to listen but also to watch the likes of Dakota Johnson, Julia Garner, Julianne Moore, Salma Hayek and Charli XCX nodding in agreement.
I also liked François-Henri Pinault remarking that 'equality is not just a woman issue — it's a human one.'
Indeed, equality in all issues, whether they be gender, race and sexuality, is a human one.
I'd argue that the best party in Cannes on Sunday night — and way, way into Monday morning — was the one Mubi organized for My Father's Shadow and Pillion, both of which were produced by Element Pictures, BBCFilm and the BFI. Mubi has North America, the UK, Ireland and Turkey on My Father's Shadow. A24 has interests in Pillion.
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In My Father's Shadow, the always excellent Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù plays the father of two schoolage boys. He travels to Lagos with his two sons on June 12, 1993, the day of the infamous Nigerian general elections. The screenplay by the Davies brothers focuses on the father's relationship with his sons, but their story is underpinned by corrupt forces trying to oust the father figure meant to lead the West African nation. The powerful sweep of the film has had many in tears.
However, there were only tears of joy at the party. The music had a full-on Afro beat, and by the time I arrived after midnight, the dance floor has packed solid. Normally people tend to slip away when the bar closes, but revelers were still dancing at 3 a.m., high on good vibes.
Actor Wendell Pierce observed the raucous dancing from the safety of the beach. He told me that he recently completed a full-length film version of the Jack Ryan series he stars in with John Krasinski. They shot the Amazon movie in London, Dubai, New York and Washington D.C.
Pierce will be working on the third season of Elsbeth. Per chance, the actor was hanging out with Melvin Taylor II, who also works on Elsbeth. Taylor's in Cannes for Baldy the Film, a short he wrote and executive produced.
Next April, Pierce will take the title role in Othello, which Simon Godwin will direct for the Shakespeare Theatre Company in D.C. 'There's a chance we might take it to London,' said Pierce.
Pillion star Harry Melling had departed by the time I arrived after midnight, the party having kicked off at 9 p.m. Sunday. But Alexander Skarsgård, Melling's co-star, was in full party mode, though I didn't actually see him shakin' it on the dance floor like Dìrísù, who would have done his Nigerian ancestors proud.
Dìrísù, and Akinola too, propelled their bodies high and low, the West African way.
The trendy Cannes crowd who pack out the private parties up in the hills above the Croisette would have had fun shimmying to a West African beat.
Quentin Tarantino on Richard Linklater's
Cannes legend Quentin Tarantino wasn't able to chat with me following the ecstatic world premiere screening in the Palais of Richard Linklater's movie Nouvelle Vague, about the making of Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless. Tarantino saw it twice in one day.
Tarantino very kindly posted me a note about Nouvelle Vague which read: 'It made me weep because it reminded me how much I loved Godard's early films as a young man in my twenties. But more importantly it gave me back the joy that I felt in his early work that maturity and Godard's boorish hateful personality had robbed me off. But make no mistake, that 'Joy' is not Godard's … it's Linklater's.'
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