The next big thing?

MARGARET AGNEW discusses the price of milk, ghosts, Tolkien fantasy, and forthcoming projects with our latest actor to catch the eye of the big boys in Tinseltown.

Kiwi actor Karl Urban is riding the crest of a wave, appearing in two international feature films that are currently screening at New Zealand cinemas.

The epic fantasy Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers seems a world away from the recently released horror film Ghost Ship, but Urban is happy with how his career is shaping up. The ruggedly handsome actor is currently in Los Angeles "just doin' some business over here". He says there are a couple of projects he's really interested in.

Urban has been a regular visitor to Tinseltown over the last couple of years -- "I make these mercenary little runs" -- staying a few weeks at a time.

"After The Price of Milk I was fortunate enough to secure a good agent and manager, and have been working on fostering new work prospects."

He happily admits he's looking for work at the moment, but such is the lot of a jobbing actor. It's just that, now, Urban is fishing for acting work in a larger pool of opportunity.

"It's funny how it works over here," he muses. "A lot of the time you do do auditions but, you know, quite a lot of the time you just meet people. Sometimes they don't even make you audition."

That's because he's in the enviable position where his screenwork is becoming recognised -- "they know you're capable of it, so they just want to meet you".

"On the one hand, it's lovely to have the acknowledgment, but then, on the other hand, I do recognise that it is a media device, and I don't take it too seriously."

That realistic attitude doesn't mean he's not gunning for the top.

"I haven't been an actor for 12 years to stop now. I feel that I've reached a point in New Zealand now that either my choices were to leave the country -- go to Australia, or try and get work in America," he says.

"Because, the fact is, there just aren't that many feature films made in New Zealand, and I've done a bunch of them. The New Zealand film industry is, relatively speaking, quite myopic. I mean, we didn't even have an awards ceremony last year because there were no feature films. So it's tough to make a living in New Zealand."

He decided against Australia as more of the same -- treading the boards and treading water -- until heading to the US for work.

Urban's well aware that he may be heading away from the art of acting.

"Particularly for a lot of American actors, I see that they are entrenched in the business aspect of being an actor and I think that's why Australasian actors have an advantage over them. Kiwi and Australian actors have an opportunity to work in all the different mediums, so they can gain a lot more experience over their American counterparts, at a relatively early age."

Urban shot the horror film Ghost Ship last January.

"What appealed to me about it was, to my knowledge, I hadn't seen anything like it in recent cinema, so that was appealing and automatically I felt that the situation these characters were in would take the audience out of their zone of comfort.

"Also it was a fantastic opportunity to work with a couple of actors who I have much respect for -- Gabriel Byrne and Julianna Margulies, and actually also Alex Dimitriades and Ron Eldard, but especially the former two."

Urban has the grace to be amused by the recent description of his performance in Ghost Ship as "a low- budget Johnny Depp".

He says he isn't offended by anything said in the media as "it's their job".

Urban says his career aims are pretty simple. He wants to continue to work with a high calibre of actors, such as Viggo Mortensen and Gabriel Byrne, and he'd like to make some more films, both overseas and in New Zealand.

"New Zealand's my home, always will be. I'd be pretty reluctant to leave it but I can see that over the next few years I'll spend more and more time away."

He's not particularly interested in further study. Urban says he got his experience on the go. "I never saw much point in studying for a profession where you spend 90 per cent of the time unemployed."