Nicole Kidman has always marched to the beat of her own drum. 

In her new cover shoot with Vogue Australia, the "Expats" actress poses in black lingerie, her shoulders adorned with a slithering black snake. 

"I like them," she says of the reptiles. "I think they're very beautiful." 

She's particularly intrigued by their ability to shed skin.

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"You can become and try different things all the time, which is what excites me," she said. 

But Kidman is more reluctant to say she is going through her own transformation, rejecting the notion that she's actively reinventing herself.

"I don’t even see it as reinvention," she told the outlet. "I think it’s more like different facets that you discover that are in existence, but you are attuned to the discovery of them. Yes, I remain very open and still very passionate about what I do and curious. And those elements haven’t been dampened.

"You can either become more rigid as you become older, but you can also become more free."

In her teenage years, Kidman explored her freedom, admitting she'd sneak into nightclubs. 

"Which, you know, everyone did, and everyone probably still does," she said. 

In the middle of the night, her father would be responsible for locating his daughter and bringing her home. 

"People would be like, ‘Who’s that?’ And it would be my father showing up to drag me home," the mother of two said, laughing. 

"I’m grateful for that now. There were always those two things happening, where I was like, ‘I wanna be wild!’ And then I would have a strong family and nourishing home. I probably still have those two parts to my personality."

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Kidman remembers her mother, Janelle, often saying, "You can go and explore things and try things, but don’t lose your head.

"But she never said don’t go and explore. When I think back on it, I’m like, ‘Wow! That was great.’"

Gaining notoriety at a young age, her big break came in 1989 with the movie "Dead Calm." 

The Australian-American actor believes that particular way of living has propelled her forward. 

"That’s probably seeped over into the way I approach my career and my life as well. Because I was thrust into it all at a very early age. But I wasn’t destroyed by it either," she said of early success. 

It's how she approaches life at 56.

"I wish they weren’t there," she said of expectations. "Because I think the idea of having to fulfil an expectation — that doesn’t feel good. That feels frightening. I don’t want to be a role model for anyone. I’m not interested in that. I’m interested in artistically exploring what it means to be a human being … the idea of life and death and love and pain and joy."