Nicole Kidman keeping it real in latest roles

LOS ANGELES - With several films set to debut this year, Nicole Kidman will again become a familiar face in theaters.

While maintaining a steady presence in Hollywood for more than two decades, the 46-year-old Academy Award winner has been focusing more in recent years on raising her two daughters with husband and country star Keith Urban, away from the spotlight in Nashville, Tenn.

For her latest role in "The Railway Man," out April 11, the star of "Moulin Rouge" and "The Hours" plays Patti Lomax, a supportive wife to World War II veteran Eric Lomax (Colin Firth). This year, Kidman will also play a villainess in "Paddington," amnesiac in "Before I Go to Sleep" and Grace Kelly in "Grace of Monaco," which is opening the Cannes Film Festival.

Q: How do you approach playing characters based on real people?

A: Patti is different because she's still alive and was able to give me information about herself. I didn't meet her until I started filming. Everyone kept saying, "Do you want to meet her?" I was like, "No, I'd really like to be able to watch her in an interview."

The producer sat with her for hours - he's a very good friend of hers - and taped her and sent me the tapes. I basically had access to her whole life, stories about her, her mannerisms and behavior, like I was a fly on the wall.

Q: You have three films coming out with Colin Firth ("The Railway Man," "Before I Go to Sleep," "Paddington"). What compels you to continue to work with him?

A: I just enjoy him. I really enjoy his brain and his talent, but he has a really great sense of humor.

Me and millions of other women in the world go, "Wow! Colin Firth!" I now know him in a different way, but I have such respect for him as an actor.

Q: What it was like to play Grace Kelly. Have you seen the film yet?

A: I have not seen the version that's showing at Cannes. It was the chance of a lifetime to play her. I really admire her, and I think she has such otherworldly qualities. I think she has an aura about her. I don't know if I'm able to capture that, but I was honored to have the chance to. It's only a six-month period of her life that we depict. It's a fairytale. Q: Where are you most happy these days? Is it in Nashville or on a set or back in Australia?

A: Happiness, that's obviously different for everybody, but what I call my joy, the thing that makes me feel incredibly satiated, is my family, and then I get to go and play out all of my ideas and feelings through all these different characters. Then, I come back to just being mama.