Nicole Kidman Reveals Why She and Lenny Kravitz Called Off Their Engagement
Who: Oscar-winning actress Nicole Kidman, 51, and four-time Grammy-winning rock star Lenny Kravitz, 54.
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How they met: It’s unclear if this exchange marks their introduction, but according to People, Kravitz was Kidman’s landlord when they began dating around 2002.
Why we loved them: They tried almost comically hard to keep their relationship under wraps. Like, it was nearly 15 years later that we (the people) learned they were once engaged. “A” for effort, guys.
When they peaked: We don’t actually know where Lenny factors into this equation, but according to his daughter, Zoe (who happens to be Kidman’s Big Little Lies co-star), Nicole was a pretty amazing prospective stepmom. “I hadn’t seen her in a long time before Big Little Lies, but there was a point where we were all kind of living together,” Zoe told The Edit. “I was about 13, and she would take me to see movies; she was so nice to me.”
The breakup: Back in 2007, before we knew for certain that Nicole and Lenny had once been engaged, the actress opened up about that time she “got engaged to somebody.” Whoever could it be?? “It just wasn’t right,” she went on. “I wasn’t ready. We weren’t ready … I get engaged and I get married — that’s my thing. I don’t want to date. I’m interested in a very, very deep connection.”
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Still, to this day Nicole and Lenny are on shockingly good terms.
Back in 2013, the former couple stopped to say hello and pose for photos when they ran into each other at the CMT Music Awards in Nashville, which Nicole happened to be attending alongside her current husband (!), Keith Urban. And honestly, it doesn’t even look awkward. #ExGoals right here.
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Nicole and Lenny shared a hug once more at the Hollywood Film Awards in 2016.
A year later, when Big Little Lies began its press tour, Nicole (perhaps unknowingly), revealed that she and Kravitz had once been engaged. “I knew Zoe because I was engaged to her father,” she said of her co-star. “It’s all in the family! I love Lenny; he’s a great guy.”
Kidman isn’t the only one to wax poetic about her ex. Months later, Kravitz told Mr. Porter’s The Journal, “Nicole is amazing. Zoe and she hadn’t spent time together since she was younger, since Nicole and I were together, so that was great,” he said of their on-set bonding.
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Where they are now: Lenny Kravitz, who wed Cosby Show star Lisa Bonet in 1987 and welcomed daughter Zoe the following year, never remarried after their early ‘90s split. That being said, he’s been romantically linked to many women through the years: Adriana Lima, Vanessa Paradis, Kylie Minogue, Madonna, Naomi Campbell, Michelle Rodriguez, Marisa Tomei, Kate Moss, and, currently, Brazilian model Barbara Fialho.
On the professional front, Kravitz’s career is still full speed ahead. The enduring rocker released his eleventh studio album in September and is already working on his twelfth.
Five years after finalizing her divorce from Tom Cruise, Kidman married country singer and fellow Australian Keith Urban. Kidman and Urban share two daughters — Sunday, 10, and Faith, 7. Nicole also has two adult children from her marriage to Cruise: Isabella, 25, and Connor, 23.
The actress earned her fourth Oscar nomination in 2017 and first Emmy the same year. As one of the most in-demand talents in Hollywood, Nicole has a lofty slate of projects ahead of her. This year she stars in two awards season contenders: Destroyer and Boy Erased, as well as DC’s Aquaman. Next year she’ll return for Big Little Lies’ second season, will star in the highly anticipated adaptation of The Goldfinch, the “Untitled Roger Ailes Project,” and Rebecca Miller dramedy She Came to Me.