Success has been good to Ashton Kutcher. "I can afford to buy things!" beams the actor, best known as the airheaded Michael Kelso on Fox's That '70s Show. Indeed, his first big purchase was a new home. "And," he points out proudly, "I finally have a car that isn't from the '80s."
Pretty rad accomplishments, considering Kutcher is just 21. But ever since the former model started down the acting path, he's been racking up the credits.
In director John Frankenheimer's Reindeer Games, he plays a college kid opposite Ben Affleck. He'll vie for Rachael Leigh Cook's attentions against James Van Der Beek in Texas Rangers. And in the romantic comedy Down to You, Kutcher plays Jim Morrison.
"He's not really Jim," clarifies Kutcher, who researched the role by watching the Doors frontman on reruns of The Ed Sullivan Show. "But he always wanted to be Jim Morrison, and his name is Jim Morrison. So, he figured he'd take the easy road in life and be Jim Morrison."
Despite all the big-screen action, don't expect Kutcher to ditch his comfy sitcom digs; he's loving every moment on That '70s Show. "I never feel like I'm working--ever," he says.
It sure beats sweeping up cereal at General Mills, one of his first jobs growing up in Homestead, Iowa. (He diplomatically claims he still likes eating the stuff!) Kutcher always dreamed of acting but wasn't quite sure how to pursue it. "If you want to act [where I was raised], you can go into community theater, or you find a highly populated sidewalk."
Lucky for him, Kutcher didn't have to do either of those things. While he was attending University of Iowa's School of Engineering, a woman at a bar ponied up his entry fee in a modeling contest. "I didn't even know guys did that," he says. "I was under the impression that Fabio was the only male model." The result: He won a trip to New York and got his first runway job two days later. He phoned his father to say he wasn't coming home.
Kutcher insists he was never concerned about the model-to-actor stigma. "I don't think it ever crossed my mind," he says. "I think I'm a good actor, so I don't really worry about it. I know I'm not the best actor, but I work hard and always try to do my best."
Doesn't sound like success has changed him much. "Nah," he scoffs. "I have all the same friends. I just have a better job."