Nicole Kidman was told she was “too tall” for movies

Nicole Kidman may know how to use her height to effectively tower over Alexander Skarsgård (twice!) or an empty AMC audience now, but the Expats actress was once told it would be a hindrance to her work. When she was a teen just starting out in Australia, she “was told, ‘You won’t have a career. You’re too tall,’” the actor revealed on a recent episode of the “Radio Times Podcast” (via Variety).

“I was teased. I was called Storky,” Kidman continued. “It will bother me when I’m acting and I want to be small—but then there are times when I appreciate it when it’s related to what I’m doing and I go, ‘OK, I can use this now.’ Hey, I’m incredibly grateful to be healthy and walking around.”

Despite this change in attitude (not to mention all that she’s accomplished), it sounds like Kidman still struggles with this particular anxiety—as so many of us who had insecurities drilled into us as teenagers do. “Having said that, I’ve had knee issues and all sorts of things—partly because of my height,” she qualified the above statement. She also recalled an audition for Annie where prospective performers were measured at the door before they walked in. Anyone who was deemed too tall was immediately cut. “I had to talk my way through the door because they were measuring you before you went in. I was mortified,” she said. The whole incident prompted the actor to lie and start telling people she was “5 foot 10 ½ inches” when she’s really 5'11".

Kidman joins a long list of beautiful actresses who still couldn’t escape being told their body was wrong for the job. Just yesterday, Hannah Waddingham revealed that a drama teacher once told her “Hannah will never work on screen because she looks like one side of her face has had a stroke.” “I thought, I will do,” the Ted Lasso star responded (via Deadline). “Come hell or high water, I will work on screen.” In recent years, Sydney Sweeney has also spoken about being told she didn’t have the “right look” for TV (via GQ), as has Julianne Moore, who was somehow told to “look prettier” at the start of her career.