Sydney

Today I'm in Sydney, Australia - one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Charming, elegant, sophisticated, exciting - just like one of Sydney's most famous daughters - Nicole Kidman. In fact, she was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, on the 20th June 1967 but moved to Sydney when she was very young. Her father and mother were born in Australia. This is the reason why she has dual nationality Her father of Scottish origin and her mother of Irish origin.

When she was four she started taking ballet lessons and later went on to study at drama school in Sydney. She interrupted her studies to help her family while her mother was recovering from breast cancer.

During the 1980s she worked on some TV series and films. My favourite mini-series, and indeed the first I can remember seeing her in, was Bangkok Hilton, the story of a girl who spends time in a Thai prison because someone gave her drugs to take out of the country. Her first major film was in the same year. It is the story of a woman and her husband who take a sailing boat for a relaxing holiday but find a survivor of an accident on the way. This man is in fact a mad killer and the couple have to defend themselves from him. The title of this film is Dead Calm.

Her next film was with Tom Cruise. In 1990 they worked together on Days of Thunder, the story of a racing driver and his relationship with the doctor who helps to save his life. It's an action film and a love story. It was also a love story in real life because on Christmas Eve of the same year they got married in Colorado, USA. Before that Tom Cruise was married to the actress Mimi Rogers so they got divorced when Tom fell in love with Nicole. They adopted two children during this marriage which lasted for ten years. The last film they worked on as a married couple was also the last film of legendary Stanley Kubrick, Eyes Wide Shut, in 1999.

Since then she has made some fabulous films. I haven't seen them all but the ones I really like are Moulin Rouge, The Others, Birthday Girl, The Human Stain, Cold Mountain and The Interpreter. It was in Moulin Rouge that we discovered her amazing singing voice. She later sang a duet with Robbie Williams, a remake of Frank Sinatra's 'Something Stupid'. This was number one in the UK pop charts for three weeks, including being the prestigious Christmas number one!

Such a versatile actress should also win many awards, and she has. As well as various Golden Globes and BAFTAs she won an Oscar for Best Actress in The Hours, the story of writer Virginia Woolf. All of this deserved success also now means that she is one of the highest paid actresses in Hollywood, earning around 17 million dollars per film.

At the time of sending this postcard, Nicole has just married for the second time. The lucky man is singer Keith Urban. They made their vows in Sydney five days after her 39th birthday. I wish them every happiness.