Ashton Kutcher: from the acting hotbed of Homestead, Iowa, here comes Hollywood's new leading man

Visitors to the set of The Butterfly Effect must have thought they wandered into a time warp. Not because that's what the upcoming thriller's about, but because star Ashton Kutcher was sitting in a chair labeled "Producer." Not one to coast on his lovable stoner alter egos--That '70s Show's Kelso and Dude, Where's My Car?'s Jesse--Kutcher is a hard worker from way back. Born and bred in small-town Iowa, he swept factory floors to fund his biochemical engineering studies at the University of Iowa, then headed to New York and the catwalks of Milan as a model before finally settling in Los Angeles to try his hand at acting.

Want more proof of his work ethic? Kutcher recently wrapped a comedy called The Guest, co-starring Tara Reid (netting him another producer's chair), got hitched to Brittany Murphy--onscreen--in Just Married, out next year, and is in negotiations to star in a Dude sequel. Then, of course, there are the demands of That '70s Show and chipping in on home improvement efforts on his new pad in Los Angeles. Sounds like all those chairs might come in handy.

ASHTON KUTCHER: What's up, Spud? Don't abuse me too badly in this interview.

DAVID SPADE: [Both laugh] I know when to pull back. It's not my first day in showbiz, you know. So: Christopher Ashton Kutcher.

AK: Oh wow, you did research.

DS: Born February 7 in Homestead, Iowa. Population: 100. If you weren't the best looking kid in that town, then you'd better give it all up.

AK: I'm going to give a model's response to that: When I was in high school, I was kind of geeky, so I didn't have a girlfriend until my senior year. Actually, I was 103 pounds in high school. That's what I wrestled my freshman year, then 112 as a sophomore, and 119 in my junior year.

DS: I wrestled for a while, but I quit right after I came. [Kutcher laughs] So your first acting experience was in The Crying Princess and the Golden Goose.

AK: Yes. That was a play I did in seventh grade.

DS: And has your acting gotten better or worse since then?

AK: I've pretty much stagnated at that level, but I'm cool with that.

DS: You were living in Iowa. Are there monster truck shows out there?

AK: Oh, yeah. They had those at the Five Seasons Center in Cedar Rapids. And every Saturday we went to dirt track car racing.

DS: That's cool. Drink a few brewskies?

AK: Well, technically I was a little young to be doing that, but yeah, I absolutely did.

DS: Did they have Everclear in Iowa? It's like 1000-proof alcohol and you mix it with Hawaiian Punch. It's illegal in 48 states.

AK: Yeah. [laughs] And remember, it was Iowa, so we had a little bit of the home brew as well.

DS: Oh right--a little moonshine.

AK: My grandpa was actually one of the biggest bootleggers in the Midwest during prohibition. He used to make wine in his cellar. He would strap the bottles to the inside of my grandma's skirt and they'd peddle it in Chicago.

DS: Jesus Christ. I've stumbled onto something major here. I feel like Geraldo. [laughs) I will hand it to you, Ashton, you're going to run Hollywood. I only see Vin Diesel in your way right now, but once you get past him, it's smooth sailing.

AK: Actually, I'm thinking about shaving my head, putting on about 50 pounds and doing an action movie. So are you sporting the mullet in your new movie [Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star, to be released next year]?

DS: No. The mullet is acting all on its own. I rent it out.

AK: In the movie I just shot, The Butterfly Effect, they let me wear a beard through almost the entire thing.

DS: That's a thriller, right?

AK: It's kind of like Back to the Future [1985] meets Jacob's Ladder [1990]. Imagine if every time Michael J. Fox went back in his past, he screwed something up and it escalated into someone getting murdered in the present.

DS: I like that. It's good that you can do comedy and a more serious film. It's a tough crossover.

AK: Yeah. They don't think us funny fellows can do that dramatic stuff.

DS: With me, I don't think they want me to be at all serious. I did a sad scene in Child Star today and even the crew was like, "All right, enough with the Kleenex. Let's get back to the jokes." OK. So you also did The Guest, which is coming out soon, with Tara Reid. She's getting a bad rap--what is that all about?

AK: She's a sweet girl. It's like how you can't hear enough in the press about how you date everybody, Dave. People give you a label and then they rift on it. It's like, "David Spade was hanging out with Kathy Bates. I wonder if they've got something going on." And you're just sitting down with a friend.

DS: But Kathy Bates did give me a hand job. [Kutcher laughs] People are like, "Oh, I heard you were with--" and I'm like. "Yeah, that's my mom.

AK: It's like when I was shooting Just Married. I became really friendly with Brittany Murphy and we were hanging out all the time. Even the crew and the director were going, "Is there something going on?" which is a bummer because then you become conscious of it.