I'M NOT AFRAID TO STRIP FOR THE PART

Anna Friel on stripping off, feeling broody and her new pal Dustin Hoffman

She's young, gorgeous and succcessful - and former Brookside babe Anna Friel doesn't mind flashing her boobs if necessary.

In fact, Anna Friel has more important things on her mind when it comes to nude scenes - such as remembering her lines and keeping warm.

Speaking about her new drama Watermelon, to be screened on ITV next month, she says: "When I'm in just about every scene in a movie, I owe it to everyone else to be word-perfect.

"Same with scenes like being in the bath or whatever. You know that it's going to take a day or more to get it right, so all you can hope for is that someone manages to keep the water warm.

"I just grin and bear it. Or maybe `bare it' would be better.

"Showing my boobs off? Who cares? As long as it's not gratuitous, why not? Doesn't it always look so bloody fake if the shot is from sort of weird angle where you don't see anything at all?

"I don't go into something like that if I think that I'm going to flash myself - all I mean is that it has to feel right. It's never an issue with me, things like that - if it was, well, I just wouldn't be doing my job properly."

She adds: "In Hollywood, they seem to make a big issue of things if an actress shows her elbow from the wrong angle. I can't be doing with all of that."

In Watermelon, Anna plays a Dublin lass who moves to London and finds herself pregnant by her old boyfriend while settling into a new relationship. She has the baby, and then has to decide which of the men will be the better father.

Anna, 26, spent most of the drama wearing a prosthetic stomach. She says: "I loved wearing it and it did make me feel broody.

"The only thing that wasn't quite right was that my breasts weren't ... erm ... well, in line with the bump. So I had this perfect prosthetic thing around me down below, and a pair of old socks stuffed down my bra for the `above' bit."

Although she admits the role made her think more about children and says she and her actor boyfriend of three years, David Thewlis, would love to have kids - having a family is not in her plans just yet.

She reveals: "I loved acting with the babies who played my little daughter in the film, but I really do think that it would suit both of us better if we had them when I was about 30 - or 32. I feel I have a lot to do in my career in the next few years.

"It's really not a major issue, but when we do have children, I want to be there for them - but also continue to act. Just being at home all the time, changing nappies, would drive me insane. I'd be a basket case if all I did was to stay at home.

"But I do love anything to do with babies - it's just the way that they look at you. If they were all like the one that played my child in Watermelon, I'd have 10 of them - no question."

ANNA, 26, takes another slurp of her white wine, grins, wipes her chin with a flick of her hand, and says of Thewlis: "At the moment, we seem to have the perfect, the happiest, relationship.

"David lives in Clerkenwell, and I live in Windsor, so we both have our own space. We both have somewhere to retreat to - when and if we want to.

"But I have to say that with the recent security scares at Heathrow Airport, I feel a lot safer at David's place.

"With Windsor being right under the Heathrow flightpath, getting into town is a nightmare."

Anna reveals she has been discussing world security with one of Hollywood's best-known stars. She says: "David and I have grown very friendly with Dustin Hoffman in the last few months, and he's very anti-war as well. We talk to him a lot about the world situation, and he comes out with a lot of sense, believe me."

Anna is disarmingly frank about just about everything in her life. In Watermelon, her character Claire is a university graduate - but also a fantasist and unable to tell the truth.

Anna says: "She'd rather tell a lie than deliver the real facts. I never have had that problem myself.

"In fact, someone asked me the other day if I'd ever told a bloody great whopper, and the answer was that no, I could never think that I have.

"That's a very dull admission, isn't it? I said to the guy who asked the question, `If I did, I'd never tell you, it would ruin the lie, wouldn't it!'

"Actually, I'll make it even more dull - I don't think I've ever blagged my way into anything - a job, club, a better table at a restaurant, whatever. It's just not in my nature.

"I have always told the truth, no matter what. And sometimes - a lot of times, I guess - to my own detriment."

Anna is known as a very direct and honest worker on a film set. She says: "I don't sit there moaning on about how large the trailer they've given me is, or what the facilities are. I get on with it.

"There are films I've done where the turnaround has been so fast that the cast have done the costume changes in the nearest public toilets.

"There's no room or time for vanity in circumstances like that. It's the best way.

"I sometimes haggle, I'll admit that. On Watermelon, for example, which was shot almost entirely in Dublin, bar a couple of scenes in London, the film- makers wanted to give us a schedule of four weeks of shooting, and I didn't think we could do it in six. So we settled on five. Happy compromise.

"But then you know that the hours are going to be from 5.30 in the morning until about 9.30 at night, so all you can hope for is a comfortable bed and an opportunity to learn your lines in a bit of peace and quiet. It's not easy - and that's not a moan."

She adds: "I am no snob about what I do, that's for sure. When it comes to work, I am going to do what I want to, as long as I think that it is good for me.

"I never believed, when I started in this business 10 years ago, going into Brookside, that I would find myself where I am today. I never had a formal drama school training and what I've learned, I've learned on the set or on the stage. And sometimes, it's been terrifying - like when I did the play Closer on Broadway, for example.

"Every night, I felt totally nauseous in the wings, and every night I went and threw up in my dressing room.

"About three or four days before I go into anything new, I get really nervous and uptight, and I have to rationalise and logicalise things - and David is a great help in calming me down and telling me not to be so bloody silly."

SHE adds: "He's made me feel more and more confident. He's strong, and encouraging - and I am a great panicker.

"Apart from that, however, we hardly ever talk about shop at home - when we're together, it's anything BUT work!

"We are not party animals, really. And Hollywood doesn't really bother me - if I get a good job offer, then obviously I'll go, but California is not a place I want to settle.

"I do NOT want to be there in a few years when the kids come back from school and say in an American accent `Hi, Mom, guess what we learned today ...' My base is in the UK."

Anna, who really grabbed the public attention for the first time when she shared a notorious lesbian kiss in Brookside, says: "The thing about me is that I've been in people's eyes and homes for years, and I'm still only in my mid- twenties - they think that I've been around forever.

"The funny thing is that Ireally DO feel far older than 26 - about 10 years older. But then, nearly all my friends are of an older age-group, so perhaps that's why."

Anna has no defined career plan. She says: "I have no idea where things will go. I just keep taking jobs I hope will look good, and which stimulate me."

Long-term, Anna says she would like to be "someone like Kate Hepburn, Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, wonderful women like that. I adore and admire Julie Walters, too - and Brenda Fricker, who I consider to be a mentor, has just played my mum in Watermelon. I want to have a tangible career, one with a respectable and respected body of work."

In Watermelon, Anna was lusted after and chased by two men - has that ever happened to her?

She grins: "Nah - one bloke at a time is quite enough for me, believe me."