Nicole Kidman has described the moment she learned of her mother’s death just before accepting a major award, saying the experience left her completely devastated.

The 58-year-old spoke at a live speaker event organised by the History Channel in Philadelphia over the weekend, reflecting on the night in September 2024 when she was named best actress at the Venice Film Festival for her role in Babygirl.

Moments before she was due on stage, Nicole said she was told her mother, Janelle Kidman, had died aged 84.

The actor, who shares daughters Sunday Rose Urban, 17, and Faith Margaret Urban, 15, with musician Keith Urban, 58, described returning alone to her room in Venice as she tried to process the news.

“I’d won best actress at Venice Film Festival. This seems to be such a common theme through my life. I was about to go on stage, and I found out my mother had died. I went right back to the room in Venice, got into bed and was completely devastated,” Kidman told the audience.

She added her mother was “so much a part of my existence” and the idea of being at the awards ceremony at the moment she heard she had died was “harrowing”.

Kidman also described attempting to leave Venice before abandoning the effort.

“I remember getting into a boat in the canal, and literally at night trying to find my way to the airport, and then turning around and going, ‘I can’t even do this’.

“And then went back into the bed, and I was alone. My husband wasn’t there. My children weren’t there. I’d gone to win an award. What should have been a beautiful thing, ended up with that. But there is the contrast of life.”

Kidman also said the experience shaped her understanding of resilience.

She now tells people she can survive “pretty much anything”.

In a separate appearance two years after the Venice awards, Kidman spoke about her mother’s final days and her desire to support others in similar situations.

“As my mother was passing, she was lonely, and there was only so much the family could provide,” she told Vicky Nguyen for the Silk Speaker Series.

“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’.”

Kidman has also spoken about her mother’s influence on her life and career.

“She carved her own path and wanted her daughters to have the same opportunity to carve their own paths,” she told the Sydney Morning Herald.

“Mum didn’t necessarily get the career that she wanted, but she was determined that her daughters would have opportunities that were equal. That’s given me my life. And she gave me my life, she and my dad.”