Paparazzi swarm Sydney as Kidman and Urban prep nuptials

By April MacIntyre Jun 20, 2006, 17:56 GMT

Singer Keith Urban and actor Nicole Kidman leaving together from Kidman\'s house in Sydney, Tuesday, June 20, 2006. Urban and Kidman are to marry this weekend in Sydney. EPA/Mick Tsikas

Australia's event of the year undoubtedly will be this weekend's marriage of actress Nicole Kidman to country star Keith Urban, in Sydney, Australia.

Swarms of Paparazzi have staked out key positions, as tabloids, television and the internet will be saturated with every nuance of the couple's existence for the next week.

Paparazzi from the world over are vying in a race where just one perfect shot of the couple could rake in big piles of dough.

Aussie reporter Michael Edwards reports, "When Kidman left her home last night bound for her apparent combined birthday/hens' night, it created a media frenzy and guessing game as to her destination, with news crews camped outside both her parents' and sister Antonia's Greenwich homes."  Keith Urban's family, from Caboolture, Queensland, is expected in Sydney today, while international guests will be streaming in through the rest of the week.

By local media accounts, the couple are "expected to spend the days leading up to the wedding apart."   There is speculation that Oceanside Cardinal Cerretti Memorial Chapel, a Gothic-style sandstone church in St Patrick's Estate, will be the scene of the nuptials.