Meryl Streep revealed Nicole Kidman liked to go skinny-dipping in the ocean every morning before filming “Big Little Lies.”
The “Devil Wears Prada” star, 74, shared the hilarious habit of her former HBO co-star while presenting an award to Kidman, 56, at the American Film Institute Life Achievement Award Gala at Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on Saturday, according to Us Weekly.
“Reese [Witherspoon] told me the very first night we were up in Monterey, before we started shooting, she said, ‘You know what she does?’” Streep said of their castmate.
“I said, ‘No, Nicole?’ She goes, ‘Yeah, you know what she does? She goes out at 5, before dawn, and she goes skinny-dipping behind the hotel in the ocean.’”
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Streep recalled being flabbergasted considering the ocean was freezing in the wintertime.
“I looked at Nicole, and I said, ‘Are you kidding me? The Pacific is like 48 degrees in March,’” she said, before adding, “Nicole said, ‘Yeah! I love it!’”
Aside from Kidman’s cold plunge hobby, Streep raved about the “Bewitched” actress’ acting capabilities and called her “a wild mongrel talent.”
“You’re like a mustang, a workhorse and a champion racer all in one, but one whose spirit they’ll never break. Never,” she gushed.
The “Mamma Mia!” star said Kidman’s range of work, in and out of Hollywood, was “stunning.”
“Your list of credits and roles and good deeds in the world would take a normal person three lifetimes to achieve,” she said. “Your life and your resume challenges everything we know about how many hours there are in the day and how many places a woman can be at one time.”
Streep admitted it is “hard not to envy” Kidman but that it is also “impossible not to be in awe of her.”
The “It’s Complicated” star got to witness Kidman’s acting talents up close when she joined the cast of “Big Little Lies” for its second season, which premiered in 2019.
“When an actress bares all and leaps off into the unknown, she dives deep into the darker parts of what it is to be a human being,” Streep said. “But I don’t think it’s bravery. I think it’s love. I think she just loves it.”
“And I think that’s the greatest attribute an actor can have — that blend of appetite and curiosity and recklessness. You have that, baby.”
