Jamie Lee Curtis opens up about Nicole Kidman's 'Scarpetta' role in 'awful' confession

Jamie Lee Curtis has finally revealed how she convinced Nicole Kidman to join an ensemble cast of Scarpetta.

In a recent SXSW panel discussion, Curtis reminisced about her first meeting with Kidman, revealing how she brought the Oscar-winning actress into her television adaptation of Patricia Cornwell’s popular crime novels.

After the Freakier Friday star told Kidman about her titular character, forensic pathologist Dr. Kay Scarpetta, she got “really excited” and earnestly asked, “And you’re in it?”

Curtis, who purchased the rights for Scarpetta in 2021, said acting along with production was not her “plan.”

“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,” she explained.

However, the 67-year-old American actress and producer could not share this with Kidman because “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?’”

Notably, Curtis had given her seal of approval to the Eyes Wide Shut actress, but the main problem arose when she could not find any character to play.

After a long “scramble,” a minor character of Kay Scarpetta’s older sister, Dorothy, a children’s book author, was discovered in Cornwell’s 29-book series.

“I was like, okay, great, I’ll be her sister,” Curtis said upon the discovery, but what shook her was the fact that “Dorothy is quite a man eater.”

It is noteworthy to mention that Scarpetta, released on Amazon Prime Video on March 11, 2026, also starred Simon Baker, Rosy McEwen, Bobby Cannavale, Ariana DeBose, Jake Cannavale, and others.