Tom Cruise makes rare public comments about ex-wife Nicole Kidman

Tom Cruise is opening up about his relationship with his ex-wife Nicole Kidman in a new interview.

The 62-year-old actor, who was married to Kidman from 1990 until 2001, praised Kidman's acting prowess in a new interview with the British Film Institute's Sight and Sound magazine. While talking about the 1999 film Eyes Wide Shut, Cruise recalled flying out to meet with director Stanley Kubrick to discuss the movie at the filmmaker’s home, which led to him making a casting suggestion.

“It was basically he and I getting to know each other,” the actor recalled, according to Deadline. “And when we were doing that, I suggested Nicole play the role [of Alice]. Because obviously she’s a great actress.”

Kidman did land the role in the drama, which meant she and Cruise — who were married at the time — played couple Dr. William Hartford and his wife Alice Hartford, as they dealt with infidelity. The Mission: Impossible star went on to tell Sight and Sound that the former couple had to work hard to get the “tone of the film” right.

“It was a very unique experience, not a large crew,” he explained to the magazine. “We arrived in the summer and basically we just started testing ... the script was just an idea. We [were] constantly rewriting the scenes and shooting the scenes and then reshooting the scenes to really find the tone of the film.”

The Babygirl actress has also reflected on the movie recently, speaking about the experience in a 2020 interview with The New York Times. During that conversation, Kidman said that despite the dark tones of the film, she and Cruise often found ways to lighten the mood after a shoot.

"We would go go-kart racing after those scenes,” she revealed. “We’d rent out a place and go racing at 3 in the morning.” 

 The actress also said that they had been raising their children — daughter Isabella and son Connor — at the time, and they would often have family dinners with Kubrick, who died at age 70 shortly after the film was completed.

"We loved working with him. We shot that for two years," she said. "We had two kids and were living in a trailer on the lot primarily, making spaghetti because Stanley liked to eat with us sometimes. We were working with the greatest filmmaker and learning about our lives and enjoying our lives on set."