Nicole Kidman has opened up about her past marriage to Tom Cruise in light of the #MeToo movement, claiming that the relationship saved her from being sexually abused.

“Being married to Tom Cruise at 22 is something I’m always reluctant to talk about, because I’m married now to the man who is my great love [Keith Urban], and it almost feels disrespectful,” Kidman told New York Magazine.

Kidman said that being married to one of Hollywood’s top stars shielded her from the industry’s darker sides. She said, “I got married very young, but it definitely wasn’t power for me — it was protection. I married for love, but being married to an extremely powerful man kept me from being sexually harassed.”

Kidman went on to say that, despite the fact that she was working on major projects at the time, her marriage had kept her somewhat safe. “I would work, but I was still very much cocooned,” she said. “So when I came out of [the marriage] at 32, 33, it’s almost like I had to grow up.”

“Of course I’ve had #MeToo moments – since I was little! But do I want to expose them in an article? No. Do they come out in my work? Absolutely,” she added.

“I’m open and raw. I want to have my well of experience and emotion tapped into, used — and I’m not just talking about sexual harassment. I’m talking about loss, death, the full array of life. But it has to be by the right people so it’s not abused again.”

After meeting on the set of the film Days of Thunder, Kidman and Cruise married in 1990. The couple split in 2001 after adopting daughter Isabella, now 25, and son Connor, aged 23.

Kidman married Keith Urban, a country music musician, in 2006. Sunday and Faith, their two daughters, are ten and seven years old, respectively.

Kidman is presently working on a film on Roger Ailes, the former Fox News chairman, and the sexual misconduct claims that led to his dismissal.

She will play Gretchen Carlson, a former Fox News presenter who accused the late TV executive of sexual assault. “I’m making a movie with Charlize Theron and Margot Robbie about Roger Ailes,” Kidman admitted in her piece.

Lionsgate is apparently in talks to fund the film, which would center on Ailes’ demise as seen through the perspective of a number of female workers.

The Oscar winner ended her article by admitting that she still has trouble accepting her influence in Hollywood. “Winning an Oscar for The Hours, in 2003, I didn’t even notice the power then. I don’t know if it’s my self-esteem, but I still struggle to stand in that place and say, I’ve earned this,” she wrote. “That’s probably good, because it keeps me in a state of wonder and humility and going, Wow! You want me?“