Nicole Kidman’s third act has a disco beat. Shame the rest of us can’t keep up

When we met at the races back in 2012, Nicole Kidman was fun. Happy to yack away with a random on Derby Day, she kept pulling $100 notes from a little envelope and plonking them on the nose. I liked her panache. No pussyfooting around, just backing her instincts.

Also, her heels were cracked like anyone’s are if they get around without shoes a lot. A weirdly cool move.

I’ve cheered Nic on in her post-divorce life, the trips with her daughters, the way she looks in a tailored Chanel jean, her apparent refusal to stew on things. Smart PR move, positioning herself as the unbowed gal shucking off heartbreak to write her own third act at 59.

But Nicole’s latest outing on the cover of UK Vogue has put me off a bit. Loved the styling – rugby jumper, sunnies on 1980s beauty queen hair – but inside, ah, Nic.

Her tales of what she’s been up to this northern summer, including hot nights in Ibiza, Spain, come close to what an early 2000s radio segment used to call Proclamations of a Wanker.

“It’s a small dinner party or it’s a rave,” she said. “I’m either playing Scrabble or I’m out. It’s that simple.” The “out” version includes 10.30pm dinner and club at 1am, wearing glasses and sometimes “a little dark wig” so she can fly under the radar. Her clubbing cred was further boosted this week by her starring role in pop star Troye Sivan’s new video .

Ibiza, it turns out, is just one stop. “I’m stealth,” said Nicole. “London, Ibiza, Paris, Portofino. A Euro summer.”

Right. I don’t know what “I’m stealth” means, and I don’t know if all that makes me jealous or thrilled.

Jealous because who wouldn’t want to teleport to that place and time? Hours on the D floor. Cultivating an air of mystery via a disguise. Getting trolleyed, staggering home thinking, “shit, Steps songs haven’t aged well” and “it’s true, bodysuits don’t need to be snapped up at the crotch”.

Thrilled because it’s lovely to see someone deciding, right, that last bit of my life was brutal, but I’m alive and I’m getting back out there.

Most of us midlifers relish the idea of freedom from responsibilities other than making sure our wig’s still on. (PS Nicole, just saying, we would all still know it’s you, even with a kicky brunette pixie look.) But it’s not realistic.

Start with the calendar. Nicole’s job requires her to turn up to a set for a couple of months, say words other people have written, emote, then leave with millions of dollars. The rest of us have the sort of work that wants us there on Monday. And Tuesday. And the Tuesday after that. There are kids to drive, dogs to walk, parents to help with online banking.

Then there’s the money. Ibiza clubs surely mean a door price, a round or 40, a car home. Bloody expensive when you’re juggling school fees and car rego and mortgages.

The divorce bit is relevant to many of us, though, because that’s what this really is. A woman on the cusp of 60 feeling her way as a single person again, which is hard at any age.