Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman talk Big Little Lies

We’re not the only ones excited for this thing to get made

When two A-list movie stars decide to work with HBO, it’s a big deal. The stars in question would be Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman. Big Little Lies will kick off soon, and to celebrate Witherspoon and Kidman sat down with Variety for a meaty cover story. Oh, and director Jean-Marc Vallée came along as well.

More from Show Snob

• The Santa Clauses season 2, episode 6 recap “Wanga Banga Langa!”
• Lawmen: Bass Reeves season 1, episode 7 preview: Non-spoiler thoughts for Part VII
• Goosebumps season 1, episode 6 recap: “Night of the Living Dummy”
• Beacon 23 season 1, episode 3 recap: “Why Can’t We Go on as Three?”
• Upload season 3, episode 2 recap: “Strawberry”

The piece is filled with many little nuggets about getting Big Little Lies off the ground, such as the fact that Witherspoon handpicked Vallée to direct after working with him on Wild. She also had to convince him to hang around for the entire run, as he was originally only set to do the first two hours. Witherspoon has also been convinced by the new power of television:

"“What is film? What is TV? What is digital…I think probably within four years we’re not going to be talking about that anymore. It’s just content. Content is content. Because as an artist, the most important thing is you want to have work that reaches people. I don’t care how it gets to them.”"

We wholeheartedly agree. Big Little Lies was also slated at one point to be a film – studios were all over it – but HBO ended up the winner, even when it came down to Netflix, Amazon, and HBO. Part of the reason that HBO won came down to Nicole Kidman’s relationship with the network, as she worked with them on Hemingway & Gellhorn. Both actors are excited for Big Little Lies, with Reese Witherspoon going so as to say that “episode six is better than most movies I’ve been in.” Bold words.

Both Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman, as well as director Jean-Marc Vallée, see Big Little Lies as a seven episode movie. That’s similar to how the first season of Westworld operated, though that particular show is slated to return for years to come.

Next: HBO is making a movie about The Godfather.

The full piece is very much worth reading, especially an anecdote by Witherspoon about how she blew up at Vallée during filming. Kidman also personally assured author Lorraine Moriarty that both her and Witherspoon would be in it to get the rights.

Big Little Lies will kick off on February 19th.