The Chinese financial hub’s decision to grant exemption from quarantine to Hollywood star Nicole Kidman as she films an Amazon-funded series about the lives of wealthy expats has made the public angry.

Hong Kong maintains some of the strictest quarantine measures in the world, an approach that has kept COVID-19 cases low but left most residents cut off from overseas loved ones for the last 18 months.

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According to reports, people arriving from high-risk countries have to stay in hotel quarantine for 21 days, while lower-risk countries have to undergo seven days hotel quarantine followed by a further seven days of self-monitoring.

But the 54-year-old actor has been allowed to circumvent those rules.

Hong Kong’s Commerce and Economic Development Bureau confirmed the Australian actress and other film crew had been granted an exemption “to carry out designated professional work”.

It is also said that those exempted must take three coronavirus tests over two weeks following their arrival.

Hong Kong’s tabloids have closely followed Kidman’s appearances in the financial hub since touching down last Thursday in a private jet from Australia, including shopping two days after her arrival and later filming in the city’s Sai Wan district.

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The actor has been announced as an executive producer on “Expats”, a show based on a 2016 book by Janice YK Lee about the gilded lives of three American women in the city.

Social media has since filled with comments by expats and the local residents are expressing their anger over Kidman’s quarantine exemption. The people are also expressing their displeasure over the decision to film a series about the city’s wealthy foreign elite at a time when China is purging dissent in Hong Kong.

Taking to Twitter, @webbhk, an account popular with expats said, “Right then, that’s it. My Mum is changing her name to ‘Nicole Kidman’ and I’ve just sent my Gulfstream G650 to pick her up.”

“I’m going to make a movie about her visit to HK. It’s called, imaginatively, ‘My Mum Visits Hong Kong’,” the account added.

A popular support group on Facebook for people quarantining in Hong Kong also filled with angry comments about how many local and foreign residents have been unable to see relatives overseas for nearly two years because of the rules.

Pro-Beijing lawmaker, Elizabeth Quat said she had “concerns over the quarantine exemption granted by the government to actress Nicole Kidman” and that she had “received quite a number of complaints from Hong Kong residents”.

Quat further added that she had asked health officials to address a legislature committee on the issue.

Meanwhile, HSBC’s chairman Mark Tucker just completed the full three weeks of quarantine for arrivals from Britain.

Kidman’s exemption came just days after Hong Kong tightened its quarantine rules for multiple countries, throwing the travel plans of many into chaos towards the end of the summer holidays.