Nicole Kidman’s Surprising New Role: Death Doula

Nicole Kidman, 58, says watching her mother die taught her a difficult truth about end-of-life care: Even loving families cannot do it all alone.

Now the Oscar winner says she is going to become part of that support system: She revealed over the weekend that she is training to become a death doula after helping care for her mother, Janelle Kidman, who died in September 2024. Kidman spoke on April 11 during a sold-out appearance at the University of San Francisco’s Silk Speaker Series, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

“As my mother was passing, she was lonely, and there was only so much the family could provide,” Kidman told the crowd. “Between my sister and I, we have so many children and our careers and our work, and wanting to take care of her because my father wasn’t in the world anymore, and 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.’ So that’s part of my expansion and one of the things I will be learning.”

Kidman said the experience pushed her to begin training as a death doula, a nonmedical role that supports dying people and their families through the practical and emotional realities of end-of-life care.

While hospice workers and medical teams manage treatment and pain, death doulas focus on the emotional and logistical support that families often struggle to provide.

The actor has said she believes grief has no timetable. “I’m allowed to process it and grieve in the way I want to,” she told CBS Sunday Morning in December 2024.

On what would have been her mother’s 85th birthday in March 2025, Kidman posted on Instagram: “Missing Mumma and Papa so much on what would have been her birthday today.” A year later, the post was simpler: “Remembering my Mumma on her birthday. Always in my heart.”

Kidman’s new Apple TV series Margo’s Got Money Troubles debuts on April 15.