The White Lotus Fans Need To Watch This Nicole Kidman Series On Hulu

Did you love Mike White's globe-trotting HBO "anthology" series "The White Lotus" but wish it starred Nicole Kidman in a series of increasingly baffling wigs? You're in luck! That show exists, kind of!

Fans of "The White Lotus," a mystery show set in beautiful and far-flung locales including Hawai'i, Italy, and Thailand, should definitely check out "Nine Perfect Strangers," the second season of which is airing on the streamer weekly as I write this. Lots of folks are already checking it out: According to FlixPatrol, it's sitting in the number four slot in Hulu's top 10 TV shows as of June 13, 2025.

Based on a best-selling book by Liane Moriarty (more on her shortly), the series stars Oscar and Emmy winner Kidman as Masha Dmitrichenko, a woman hailing from Russia who's famous for her wellness center, Tranquillum House, in California. In both seasons, nine people show up at her center looking for Masha's help and wisdom; in the first season, actors like Melissa McCarthy, Michael Shannon, Samara Weaving, Grace Van Patten, Regina Hall, and Bobby Cannavale (who spoke to /Film about his role) play visitors looking for solitude and serenity. Season 2 starts fresh with just Kidman returning and brings luminaries like Christine Baranski, Dolly de Leon, Henry Golding, Lena Olin, musician King Princess, Annie Murphy, and Mark Strong on board and is set in a different resort located in the Swiss Alps. (Perhaps that's why Kidman's wig changes between seasons.)

Not only is "Nine Perfect Strangers" yet another fun small-screen vehicle for Kidman (who, bless her, is never not working), it is, like "White Lotus," a fun way to assemble a star-studded cast and bring them to a remote location for maximum drama. Still, there's something really interesting about "Nine Perfect Strangers" — it continues a trend of sorts for Kidman, specifically concerning Moriarty adaptations.

"Nine Perfect Strangers" is adapted from Liane Moriarty's 2018 novel of the same name (the series premiered its first season back in 2021). Though the first season covers the plot of the book, the show continues past the end of Moriarty's original story, with creator and showrunner David E. Kelley building out Masha's world (and manipulations) to create a larger narrative. Why am I mentioning this, and what "trend" is this continuing? 

Well, from 2017 to 2019, Nicole Kidman starred in "Big Little Lies," a massively popular HBO series that — you guessed it — is also based on a book by Moriarty of the same name, which was released in 2014. Kidman leads that series alongside Laura Dern, Reese Witherspoon, Zoë Kravitz, and Shailene Woodley, where she plays Celeste Wright, a woman with a seemingly perfect life and marriage to her wealthy and successful husband, Perry (Alexander Skårsgard). It seems perfect, but the truth is terrifying: Perry is physically abusive, and he frequently attacks Celeste behind closed doors. When the women come together at the end of season 1 of "Big Little Lies" — an alliance that ends in Perry's death — that tracks with the end of the novel. Still, the series was so successful (it won multiple Emmys, including ones for Kidman and Skårsgard) that HBO decided to produce another season, and to say it provided diminishing returns is an understatement. 

The point is, this is the second time Kidman has led a series based on a novel specifically by Moriarty that continued past its source material, and it's also the second example of this being spearheaded by Kelley, who worked on both shows as creator, writer, executive producer, and showrunner.

As a rule, I'm pretty against showrunners forging past the conclusion of the project's source material; "Game of Thrones" is a good cautionary tale about just that, and though consensus is more mixed on "The Handmaid's Tale," that book is not that long and yet somehow expanded into a six-season run. So did the second season of "Nine Perfect Strangers" match up to its first, despite not having any source material?

When it comes to the critical consensus, they're not crazy about "Nine Perfect Strangers" — though season 1 was, according to many of them, pretty entertaining anyway. On Rotten Tomatoes, the debut outing earned a 59% average rating with a summary that reads, "A meandering mystery may muddle its impact, but strong performances across the board from this eclectic ensemble mean 'Nine Perfect Strangers' is never less than watchable." Over at IndieWire, Ben Travers was pretty harsh about the entire project, including Nicole Kidman's accent work: "Playing a cult-like figure running a secretive resort, the only thing wobblier than the Australian Oscar winner's Russian accent are the lifeless scripts." In her review for Thrillist, Esther Zuckerman had a positive take on the series as a whole but found Kidman's Masha a bit baffling, writing, "'Nine Perfect Strangers' is entertaining enough, and features great performances, specifically from [Melissa] McCarthy and [Regina] Hall, but the question of what Masha is exactly up to is never compelling enough to make the series a must-watch."

Season 2 of "Nine Perfect Strangers" fared worse with critics. "A less than savory return for the Psychedelics queen and her new posse of socialites places this second season of Nine Perfect Strangers into a definitive sophomore slump," the Rotten Tomatoes critical consensus reads next to the season's 46% average, and individual critics weren't much kinder. Eric Deggans liked the second season; in his NPR review, he wrote, "Backed by an ensemble including Mark Strong, Christine Baranski, and Murray Bartlett, it's an interesting ride that balances the dramatic and bizarre in compelling ways." But Kristen Baldwin was blunt in her assessment for Entertainment Weekly, saying, "Though the eight episodes are peppered with twists — including one late reveal that feels recycled from season 1 — 'Nine Perfect Strangers' forgot a key ingredient for its storytelling smoothie: Fun."

That's not to say that you shouldn't check out "Nine Perfect Strangers," especially if you're looking for a soapy, silly, and campy fix until the next season of "The White Lotus" premieres. The show is available to stream on Hulu, and it closes out its second season on July 2, 2025.