MALIN Akerman is about to watch her star strike the stratosphere with her role in Watchmen, but her family keeps her grounded.

Some Hollywood stars treat an interview like a trip to the dentist. Every question is answered as if a molar is being wrenched from their jaw

The minute Watchmen star Malin Akerman enters the room, however, any thoughts of the dentist’s chair disappear amid a cloud of enthusiasm, flowing blonde hair and long legs. Very long legs.

“How cool is this?” Akerman gushes. “I’m in Melbourne!”

Best known for her performance as Ben Stiller’s deranged wife in The Heartbreak Kid, Akerman is a rare breed among movie actors: she still gets excited about the little things.

Thanks to her latest role, as superhero Silk Spectre II in Watchmen, one of those little things is a mini version of herself.

A perk of playing a superhero is the action figure.

“The whole experience of being in Watchmen is quite surreal, especially the action-figure bit,” she says. “It will be really cool when I become a grandmother and I’m showing my grandchildren how I used to look.”

Akerman’s acting career began in childhood, with a few commercials in her native Canada.

She began a university degree, but just when she’d dedicated herself to studying, she was lured away.

“I was studying psychology, but as I was doing that the acting started to take off. I was getting guest-star roles and really enjoying it,” she says.

“It was kind of like psychology, a little more selfish, but for that time it was good fun. When you are young like that you cannot fathom doing seven years of school. I just seized the opportunity.”

Now 30, Akerman’s big break came in the 2007 comedy Heartbreak Kid, in which she took the term “bunny boiler” to a whole new level.

“Yeah that performance was very close to home,” she jokes.

Akerman puts her winningly loony performance in the film down to her upbringing.

“I have grown up in such a crazy family. They are super-sarcastic, not prudish at all. My mum — all my friends wanted to come over and hang out with my mum. We are all very goofy, and being that dorky, crazy sort of person is just me.

“Look, I have no pride. I don’t have to look hot or sexy all the time. I actually prefer to just chill out and have fun.

“I grew up hanging out with boys and they are much more about joking and having fun, it’s not so much about looks.”

Which is why Akerman finds comedy such a natural fit. It’s the drama she finds more of a stretch.

“There was not as much drama in my family . . . well, there was, but we suppressed it. That’s how we deal with it, right?” she says with a laugh.

As her star continues to rise — after Watchmen and last year’s 27 Dresses, she’ll next be seen with Ryan Reynolds in The Proposal — she knows there are particular challenges ahead.

“If you surround yourself with people who feed into bad habits it can be difficult to stay grounded,” she says.

“I have great friends around me (who are) not in the business, which allows me to treat it all like a job.

“It’s a fun job, but it’s just a job. And if I stepped out of line my family would knock me back into line quick smart.”

From the Herald Sun