Kidman previously compared starring in the series to “doing a thesis in the CIA”
Credit: ANGELA WEISS / AFP via Getty; Cindy Ord/Getty; Kevin Mazur/MG26/Getty
NEED TO KNOW
- Zoe Saldaña and Nicole Kidman star in Lioness, Taylor Sheridan’s hit CIA thriller
- The actresses start their day by going over scenes, and they often text the show’s creator afterward, they shared during a recent event
- New episodes of Lioness season 3 drop Sundays on Paramount+
Zoe Saldaña and Nicole Kidman are frequently blowing up Taylor Sheridan’s phone on the Lioness set.
The dialogue is the Paramount+ series — which follows CIA operative Joe (Saldaña) and her team, helmed by CIA supervisor Kaitlyn (Kidman) — often leads to its stars seeking out Sheridan, 56, before filming even begins.
“We leave these messages, these voice messages sometimes,” Saldaña, 48, said at Paramount+’s The Icons of Taylor Sheridan’s Universe event in April. “In our makeup trailer, we’ll visit each other. I’m like, ‘Did you figure that out? I didn’t, either.’”
Credit: Ryan Green/Paramount+
It’s only when they’re both stumped that they bring the series creator into the mix and send him a voice memo. “Hi, Taylor. For the 20th time, sending you a text,” Saldaña said, sharing an example of what she and Kidman, 59, send to Sheridan. “And then on our way to set, I’m like, ‘Call us. We need you.’ And then he’ll call us.”
The storyline of the series “is so relevant,” Kidman added during the New York City event. “It’s like, wow, it’s so topical, and you’re constantly treading in these minefields, and you’ve got to keep up — like really keep up — because it’s really hard to follow.”
Sheridan is not only an asset for the actresses on the creative side, but he’s also “an incredible acting coach,” Kidman added. “You can have one call with him, and he’ll give you four words of how to play the scene,” she explained.
That advice is particularly helpful given how much “technical jargon” there is in the scripts. “We have to understand every single thing we’re saying. It has to come trippingly off your tongue. You have to understand everything, and it has to be [like it’s] something that you are using as everyday language all the time, which obviously we’re not.”
“It’s been incredibly exciting, it’s like suddenly doing a thesis in the CIA,” Kidman added of working on the series.
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In Lioness, Saldaña plays a woman who was “conditioned very early on in her life to take on a great deal of responsibility, and as long as she convinces herself with the woman that she stares at in the mirror, that she can do it all, she’s gonna be okay,” she said at the season 3 premiere. What’s “so beautiful” about Joe, Saldaña told PEOPLE, is that Sheridan shows the audience “that maybe she can’t [do it all] — and it makes you question whether or not that’s bad, if you can’t do it all.”
New episodes of Lioness season 3 drop Sundays on Paramount+.
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