Liev Schreiber quickly learned on the set of The Perfect Couple that Nicole Kidman has a hidden “inappropriate” side.
“I got things from Nicole Kidman that I had no idea existed,” Schreiber, 56, joked during a Thursday, September 12, appearance on SiriusXM’s The Jess Cagle Show With Julia Cunningham. “You know, she really exudes grace and elegance and authority and all these things. I’m here to tell you that I have never met anyone so quick to be inappropriate on a set than Nicole.”
According to Schreiber, the 57-year-old actress came up with “some of the biggest doozies” between takes.
“One day, they will release the outtakes from this show and all of our improvs, preferably one day after we’re all dead, and you’ll see some extraordinary Nicole Kidman footage,” Schreiber recalled. “It was really fun.”
The Perfect Couple, based on Elin Hilderbrand’s bestselling novel of the same name, begins when a beach wedding is uprooted after a dead body washes ashore. The entire Winbury family (including the matriarch and patriarch played by Kidman and Schreiber) are presumed suspects.
Kidman’s outtakes aside, Schreiber had the best time filming the limited series.
“We’ve been friends for years and I never really imagined us working together, so it was one of the great surprises of doing this gig,” Schreiber said on Thursday.
The Ray Donovan star, however, needed convincing to initially take the role.
“I had my doubts in the beginning — you know, the character’s such a douche,” Schreiber told TheWrap in a September 8 interview. “I was like, ‘Do I really want to do this?’”
He continued, “[Our director] really opened it up and said there would be improv [and] we’d be able to find the sort of comic elements of it and the duality and the fullness of it, and it just sounded like it would be really fun. I’m thrilled with how it turned out for the most part.”
Kidman was also one of the reasons that Schreiber signed onto the production. The Australian actress has been longtime friends with Schreiber’s ex Naomi Watts, with whom he shares children Sasha and Kai. (Schreiber also shares youngest daughter Hazel with wife Taylor Neisen.)
“Oh, I had to beg him to marry me,” Kidman quipped to Entertainment Tonight earlier this month, noting that she asked Watts, 55, if it was OK first.
Schreiber added at the time, “Isn’t that amazing? That’s how close they are.”
Schreiber and Watts, who is now married to Billy Crudup, have remained on amicable terms since their 2016 split.
“We’re doing things very differently,” Watts told PorterEdit in August 2019. “I’m pretty proud of us, corny as that may sound. We’ve made it our absolute priority to be good and kind to each other and we’re absolutely committed to that.”
The exes, as well as their new partners, have frequently reunited for Sasha and Kai’s various milestones through the years.
The Perfect Couple is currently streaming on Netflix.
