Nicole Kidman Reveals More About Her Decision to Become a Death Doula, Says She Has Right 'Personality' for Role
Nicole Kidman Reveals More About Her Decision to Become a Death Doula, Says She Has Right 'Personality' for Role
Gina Kalsi, Meredith WilshereMon, April 20, 2026 at 1:13 PM UTC
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Nicole KidmanCredit: ANGELA WEISS / AFP via Getty -
Nicole Kidman says her interest in becoming a death doula began after her mother's death in 2024
Kidman believes death doulas are essential for providing care and connection during the end-of-life process
The actress says you have to be a "certain personality" to be able to be a death doula
Nicole Kidman says she fits the "certain personality type" needed to become a death doula and finds the training process for the role “fascinating.”
The actress, 58, opened up about her new interest when she spoke to journalist Hoda Kotb at a HISTORYTalks event on Saturday, April 18, in Philadelphia.
When asked what a death doula was, Kidman said, “It's helping people in the end stage of life. It's helping the families. It's being present, impartial.”
The Babygirl star previously revealed that she got the idea to explore becoming a death doula after her mother, Janelle Ann Kidman, died aged 84 in September 2024.
“I think it's fascinating,” she added. “It's, it's a really fascinating, it's very beautiful and you have to be a certain personality to be able to do it, but I found out that I'm actually that personality.”
Nicole Kidman at the Oscars in 2026Credit: Arturo Holmes/Getty
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Kidman continued, “It's very important to me. There is always suffering in life, right? But if there [are] people there who can help with that and can help those final stages be less painful, you can feel the connection and the love, then that is a lovely thing to be able to do. So that's what I'm exploring.”
The mom of four said she believes death doulas are a “huge necessity” because of longer life expectancies, the “loneliness” that some people face and “the way in which people are treated in [that] stage of life.”
Kidman previously told investigative journalist and USF graduate Vicky Nguyen that while her mother was passing, she felt “lonely,” as there was “only so much the family could provide," per the San Francisco Chronicle.
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The Holland actress has four children, while her younger sister Antonia Kidman, 55, has six.
“That's when I went, ‘I wish there was these people in the world that were there to sit impartially and just provide solace and care," she said as part of the school's Silk Speaker Series.
The International End-of-Life Doula Association states: "An end-of-life doula advocates self-determination and imparts psychosocial, emotional, spiritual, and practical care to empower dignity throughout the dying process."
Nicole Kidman with her mom Janelle Ann KidmanCredit: nicolekidman/Instagram
Kidman says she's had a mixed reaction to her new career, laughing as she told Kotb: “[It] seems to have people either bemused or intrigued.”
Kidman also opened up about the moment she found out that her mother had died, just moments before she was set to take the stage at the 2024 Venice Film Festival.
“There was this enormous high," she told Kotb. "I was about to go on stage and I found out my mother had died and I went right back to the room in Venice, got into bed and [I] was completely devastated and thought, ‘I do not know how I'm gonna move forward or function now.' She was so much a part of my existence.”
Kidman added that her then husband, Keith Urban, and her four children, Bella, Connor, Sunday Rose and Faith Margaret, were not present.
“I'd gone to win an award where it should have been a beautiful thing and ended up with that,” she said. “But that there is the contrast of life. And that's what I always say to people. I say, ‘Ah, that's when I know I'm resilient, that's when I know I can survive pretty much anything.'”
Kotb asked Kidman what her mother had passed on to her children, to which she replied: “She primarily told me, ‘Don't ever let anyone break your spirit.'”
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
