Nicole Kidman & Zac Efron's Electric Chemistry Left Their 'A Family Affair' Director in Awe

Alice Kelly
·3 min read
20

Nicole Kidman and Zac Efron will be setting hearts racing in their steamy new Netflix movie, A Family Affair, once it premieres on June 28 and their director says we’re in for a treat.

Richard Lagravenese directed the duo in the romantic-comedy, which also stars Joey King, Kathy Bates and Liza Koshy. The movie is about a young personal assistant named Zara (King) who discovers her self-obsessed movie star boss (Efron) is having a secret romantic relationship with her widowed mom (Kidman).

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The movie has promised many intimate scenes between Kidman and Efron, as is evident in the trailer alone and, in a conversation with SheKnows, Lagravenese gushed all about his talented stars and their electric chemistry on set.

“I don’t think you create chemistry. It’s either there or it isn’t, and that’s something you roll the dice on as a filmmaker,” Lagravenese says. “And they just had it from the very first moment they came back on set.”

Efron and Kidman previously played love interests in 2012’s Paperboy, which is a much darker romance story than what we see in Lagravenese’s upcoming movie, but the director says the actors were able to pick up where they left off.

“[When] they saw each other for the first time… they just threw their arms around each other, and the friendship blossomed again, and they just talked about old times, and then they went right into the script,” Lagravenese adds. “The chemistry was right there.”

Nicole Kidman & Zac Efron in 'A Family Affair.'
Nicole Kidman & Zac Efron in ‘A Family Affair.’

In a June 13 interview with People, Efron revealed that there was no awkwardness when it came to filming sex scenes with Kidman. “I guess, with Nicole, but I don’t know what it is. I think we kind of got through that in the past and now we’re just very comfortable together,” he said. “It feels like you’re there with someone that we have a very trusting relationship. And I mean, they had to cut out all how much we were laughing.”

Lagravenese also had high praise for Kidman’s on-set presence when he talked to us.

“She’s iconic, you know, and she’s just this amazing talent, and also is one of the few actresses today that has that classic Hollywood star thing about her, you know, that incandescence,” he gushes. “She’s so professional and smart and down to earth, she cares so much, and she’s so empathetic.”

“There was one day I was having a hard time,” Lagravenese shares, revealing a particularly kind exchange with Kidman. “I was getting a little anxious and frustrated in between takes and she took me privately and says, ‘Let’s talk for a second.’ She just she felt it, and she talked me through it.”

“I just fell in love with her. I would just do anything for her.”

Before you go, click here to see the steamiest sex scenes between older women and younger men.

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