Rob Lowe Names Nastassja Kinski His Best On Screen Kiss

Hollywood actors have shared stories about their most memorable and disappointing on-screen kisses, revealing how appearance, personal chemistry and unexpected filming conditions shaped their experiences. Rob Lowe identified Nastassja Kinski as his favorite kissing partner on screen, while Nicole Kidman and Kate Hudson recalled encounters that fell short of their expectations.

Lowe discussed his experience during an appearance on Watch What Happens Live with host Andy Cohen. Playing the show's Plead the Fifth game, the actor named Kinski, his co-star in The Hotel New Hampshire, as the best on-screen kisser of his career.

Lowe explained that Kinski's appearance made the experience particularly memorable.

"Have a look at her," Lowe said when asked what made her the best. "At that moment in time, she was probably the most beautiful woman I’d certainly ever seen."

Despite the admiration, Lowe acknowledged that kissing Kinski made him feel "very, very scared."

Sharon Stone also singled out a prominent Hollywood actor when discussing her favorite on-screen kiss. During an April interview on SiriusXM's Radio Andy, she praised Robert De Niro for their scene in the 1995 movie Chicago, describing the experience as particularly memorable.

"the best kisser in the business," Stone said of De Niro during the interview.

Stone recalled a scene in which her character persuaded De Niro's character to give her money to use the bathroom. After receiving an initial payment, she indicated that she wanted more before leaning in to kiss him.

"We did this scene where I have to go to the bathroom, and because I play this hustler, I get him to give me money to go," Stone explained. "He gives me this money and I look at him like, ‘Really? I think a little more than $50 for the bathroom.' And he … reaches in, and he gives me, like, $100, and then I lean over, and I kiss him."

Stone said both actors were willing to repeat the scene after director Martin Scorsese asked whether they wanted another take.

"We both looked at him and went, 'Yeah, I think maybe we need one more,'" Stone recalled.

Sylvester Stallone, however, remembered his famous kiss with Talia Shire in Rocky for an entirely different reason. In an interview with Page Six Hollywood, Stallone described the scene as unpleasant because Shire had a runny nose, although he did not blame his co-star.

"Then I go in to kiss her — pull the hat off, the glasses — and… her nose is running. Badly," Stallone recalled. "So we go in for the kiss and she goes [bad coughing noise].

And I go, ‘Oh my God!’And I have to keep moving forward. There is no reverse. So I knew exactly as soon as I kissed her that within an hour I had the flu."

Stallone said he was in bed with a runny nose shortly after filming the romantic scene.

Nicole Kidman identified an avoidable problem behind one of her least enjoyable on-screen kissing experiences. During a March appearance on the Las Culturistas podcast, the actress discussed her dislike of bad breath and recalled that her Big Little Lies co-star Alexander Skarsgard had eaten falafel before they were scheduled to film a romantic scene.

"You want me to lean in? Smell good," Kidman said while explaining her expectations for an on-screen kiss.

Kidman said she objected to Skarsgard eating the food shortly before their scene because she wanted the romantic moment to feel convincing.

"I'm like, 'No, no, no, Alex. I'm meant to be kissing you and into you. Put away the falafel now.

Because the bad breath does not turn me on,'" Kidman recalled. "I said, 'No more falafel. Nope.

Not before you kiss. Not before you make love. No more falafel.

Put the falafel away.'"

Kate Hudson has also compared her experiences with several former co-stars. During Vanity Fair's Lie Detector Test with Janelle Monáe, Hudson described Billy Crudup's kissing style as gentler than Matthew McConaughey's, while stopping short of declaring him the better kisser.

"I think Billy is a gentler kisser," Hudson said. "Better? I wouldn’t say better.

Definitely…definitely just gentler. It’s a more sophisticated version of a kiss...It’s like theater, Stanislavski, and like Longhorns."

Asked about Dane Cook, her co-star in the 2008 film My Best Friend's Girl, Hudson dismissed the experience with a brief response.

"No. Canceled," Hudson said.

Hudson had previously criticized her kissing scenes with McConaughey during an October 2020 appearance on Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop podcast. She recalled that environmental conditions and physical mishaps affected their romantic scenes in Fool's Gold, including a sequence filmed in the ocean after a plane crash.

"The thing is, every time I kiss McConaughey, it's like there's just something happening and there's like snot or wind," Hudson said. "When we were kissing in the end of 'Fool's Gold,' we're like in the ocean, we had the plane crash. He just had snot all over his face."

Hudson separately identified Liv Tyler as her favorite on-screen kissing partner.

"She has the softest lips of them all," Hudson said.

Sally Field also recalled an uncomfortable experience with a former romantic partner. During a December 2022 appearance on Watch What Happens Live, Field described kissing Burt Reynolds while filming Smokey and the Bandit as a disappointing experience despite their real-life relationship.

"It was just not something he did very well," Field said.

When Cohen asked whether Reynolds' technique was the problem, Field clarified her criticism.

"No, we’re not totally involved [with the kiss], it was just a lot of drooling," Field said.