“This was not my plan,” joked Curtis, who is also an executive producer on the Amazon Prime crime series.

How Jamie Lee Curtis got Nicole Kidman to join Scarpetta — a year after first meeting her at the Oscars

"This was not my plan," joked Curtis, who is also an executive producer on the Amazon Prime crime series.

By Kathleen Perricone

March 17, 2026 12:16 a.m. ET

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Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis play sisters on 'Scarpetta'. Credit:

Connie Chornuk / Prime

Nicole Kidman agreed to join *Scarpetta*, as long as executive producer Jamie Lee Curtis did the one thing she absolutely did not want to do.

Curtis hilariously recounted her first conversation with the Oscar winner about starring in her television adaption of Patricia Cornwell’s popular crime novels during a SXSW panel on over the weekend.

The Australian actress gushed to Curtis how she was “really excited” to portray the titular character, forensic pathologist Dr. Kay Scarpetta, because she loved the book series.

“And you’re in it?” Kidman earnestly asked Curtis, who purchased the rights for *Scarpetta* in 2021.

“This was not my plan,” Curtis admitted at SXSW. “I wanna write checks. I don't wanna put on makeup. I wanna look at the dailies and tell people they did great… I really didn’t want to be in an hour drama TV show because the hours are *awful*.”

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Jamie Lee Curtis tears up remembering Nicole Kidman's touching first words to her when they met at the Oscars

But she couldn’t tell that to Nicole Kidman.

“When [she] looks at you with those eyes, and she goes, ‘And you’re in it?’ You say, ‘Yes, of course, I’m in it! Why else would I produce it?’”

There was just one other problem: Curtis had no idea who she would even play. After a “scramble,” producers discovered a minor character in Cornwell’s 29-book series: Kay Scarpetta’s older sister, Dorothy, a children’s book author.

“I was like, okay, great, I’ll be her sister,” exclaimed Curtis, who was pleasantly surprised to learn “Dorothy is quite a man eater.”

Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis at the New York premiere of 'Scarpetta' on March 3, 2026.

Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty

And she had the perfect actor in mind to play her husband Pete: Bobby Cannavale.

"I got a text from Jamie Lee Curtis, who I had never met before," he told *Extra*. "She said, 'Would you like to play my husband in something?' And I was like, 'That's an awesome text, tell me more.'"

As for Curtis and Kidman, they had only met once, briefly, at the Academy Awards.

"It was during COVID, when we were at cafe tables, and I was sitting at a little table, and my publicist and friend Heidi was sitting with me before the show," Curtis remembered at the SXSW panel. "Ten minutes before the show began, my tablemate hadn't arrived yet. Heidi was sitting there and she said, 'Jamie, somebody wants to talk to you.' And I said, 'What do you mean?'"

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Getting emotional as she recounted the memorable moment, Curtis said she turned around in her seat to see none other than the 5'11" actress standing there.

"This is what Nicole Kidman said to me," said Curtis, choking up. "Almost makes me cry saying it. She said, 'I see you. I see who you are. I see what you do. I see how you do it. And I really like it, and I want you to continue doing it.'"

*Scarpetta* is streaming now on Prime Video.

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