Nicole Kidman broke months of public silence toward ex-husband Keith Urban on Monday, posting a Father's Day tribute on Instagram Stories that included a throwback photo of the country music star carrying their two daughters on his back. The gesture marked her first known public acknowledgment of Urban since their nearly two-decade marriage ended in a Nashville courtroom.
Kidman, 59, shared two black-and-white photographs. The first showed her as a young girl with her late father, Antony Kidman, a clinical psychologist. The second featured Urban with daughters Sunday Rose, 17, and Faith Margaret, 15, in what appeared to be a candid family moment from years past. She captioned the post: "Happy Father's Day to all the fathers."
The post came just days after Urban, 58, had offered his own olive branch. On Saturday, he used Instagram Stories to wish his ex-wife a happy 59th birthday, writing "Happy birthday Nicole Mary!" alongside a blue and purple graphic. Neither post was elaborate. Both were notable for what they signaled, that two people navigating a very public split are still willing to acknowledge each other as parents.
The couple announced their separation last September after almost 20 years together. But AP News reported that the split had clearly been planned well before that. Kidman filed for divorce in a Nashville court, citing "marital difficulties and irreconcilable differences." A parenting plan had already been signed, Urban on August 29, Kidman on September 6, weeks before the public announcement.
That plan designated Kidman as the primary residential parent for their daughters, giving her custody for 306 days per year and Urban 59 days. A judge in Nashville officially finalized the divorce on January 6.
The timeline tells its own story. By the time the world learned the marriage was over, the legal architecture of its dissolution was already built. Celebrity breakups often arrive with a performance of shock. This one arrived with paperwork.
Neither Kidman nor Urban has stayed out of the tabloid cycle since the split. Celebrity gossip site Deuxmoi reported, via an anonymous source, that Kidman has been "enjoying a low-key romance with a 'high-profile businessman' for several months." The source claimed the relationship had been "developing" quietly and that the pair were "keeping things extremely low-key and largely out of the public eye." The identity of the businessman was not disclosed.
TMZ separately reported that Paul Salem, 62, chairman of MGM Resorts International, "had expressed interest in the Australian actress." That report added that Salem and Kidman shared mutual friends and had met socially on two occasions but stressed they were not dating at the time. Neither Kidman nor Salem has publicly confirmed or denied those reports.
High-profile divorces have a way of generating a second wave of tabloid speculation, a pattern familiar to anyone who followed the media coverage of Don Trump Jr.'s marriage to Bettina Anderson and the surrounding chatter about his previous relationship.
Urban, for his part, has faced his own round of gossip. The New York Post reported that multiple Nashville insiders fueled speculation about a romantic connection between Urban and Maggie Baugh, a 25-year-old guitarist who joined his band when his current tour launched in May 2025. One Nashville insider was quoted saying, "It is 100 percent credible that they'd be together." Baugh's father publicly downplayed the rumors.
The Post also reported that Urban allegedly changed a song lyric originally about Kidman to reference Baugh during a recent concert. A TMZ source added: "All the signs point to the fact Keith is with another woman. Let's just say Nicole doesn't dispute that, but she's still shocked over it."
Urban has continued performing throughout the divorce. At the ACM Awards in Las Vegas in May, fans noticed he was still wearing tattoos dedicated to Kidman, including the word "Mary" across his fingers and symbolic wrist designs linked to their relationship. Whether that reflects sentiment or simply the permanence of ink, observers took note.
At a Nashville concert, Fox News reported, Urban had an awkward moment when a fan introduced herself as "Nicole." He visibly reacted, falling backward on stage before deflecting with a joke about "Nicole Richie." The couple's last known public appearance together was at a FIFA Club World Cup match in Nashville in June 2025.
Country music stars navigating personal upheaval in public is hardly new. Jelly Roll and Bunnie XO have turned their own divorce into something of a content franchise, blurring the line between private pain and public brand management.
Kidman, meanwhile, offered a rare window into her state of mind in a Vogue interview published October 8. "How many times do you have to be taught that you think you know where your life is going, and then it isn't going in that direction?" she said.
The Kidman-Urban marriage was one of the entertainment industry's more durable unions. Urban publicly credited Kidman with saving him during his struggles with substance abuse. At her AFI Life Achievement Award ceremony, he said: "Four months into our marriage, I'm in rehab for three months. Nic pushed through every negative voice, I'm sure even some of her own, and she chose love. And here we are 18 years later."
Kidman herself had spoken with characteristic bluntness about marriage at the premiere of Netflix's "The Perfect Couple": "You're heading for trouble if you consider yourselves the perfect couple. I'm not a believer in perfect."
Those words landed differently once the divorce filing followed. But the Instagram exchanges over the past week, his birthday wish, her Father's Day tribute, suggest that whatever broke the marriage, both parties are choosing to keep the parenting relationship visible and civil.
That is not always how these stories go. The entertainment press rewards conflict. Gossip sites profit from escalation. The quieter path, two parents acknowledging each other on social media without drama, doesn't generate the same clicks.
The fact that celebrity divorces now routinely become content opportunities makes Kidman and Urban's restraint more conspicuous, not less.
Neither Kidman nor Urban has addressed the other's rumored new relationships on the record. No representative for Kidman has confirmed or denied the Deuxmoi report about a new romance. Paul Salem has not publicly responded to the TMZ report. The identity of the "high-profile businessman" remains unknown. And the full financial terms of the divorce settlement have not been disclosed.
What is clear is that two people who spent nearly 20 years building a life together, raising two daughters, weathering addiction, sustaining careers on opposite ends of the entertainment industry, are at least willing to tip their hats to each other in public. In a culture that monetizes bitterness, that counts for something.
A throwback photo and a birthday wish won't fix what broke. But they tell you something about the people involved, and about what kind of example two parents are choosing to set for a 17-year-old and a 15-year-old watching from the other side of the screen.
