Keira Knightley is facing up to life as a shooting star after being cast in a series of movie blockbusters. The actess puts it all down to luck and still feels her success could disappear overnight. Steve Pratt reports on the current Keira craze.

SHE'S not yet 20 but already British actress Keira Knightley is being hailed as "the next big thing" after appearing in several of the biggest cinema hits of recent years. With Pirates Of The Caribbean, Love Actually, Bend It Like Beckham and now King Arthur to her credit, you could be excused for thinking that she might have been carried away by success.

Not a bit of it. Knightley reckons she's been "incredibly lucky". The recent Vanity Fair cover girl seems to be keeping a very level head about all the fuss being made of her. "Acting is a profession that's built up and blown down in a moment," she says.

"It's all very nice when people say, 'You're the next big thing' but acting is a profession where you're hot one minute and not the next.

It can be gone in a puff of smoke so I think what you should do is just try and do projects that interest you and that you hope other people will find interesting."

Since her big screen debut five years ago in the Star Wars prequel, The Phantom Menace, her choices have been impeccable. The daughter of actor Will Knightley and writer Sharman Macdonald admits her current movie success is the fulfilment of a childhood dream because she's always loved watching movies.

"I love the escapism of film and I love the stories. So it's incredible for me to be involved with them as much as I am, from the very first stitch in a costume to the end product. That's what I always wanted to spend my time doing."

Yet she hates watching herself on the big screen, insisting she's always been insecure about her looks. "I loathe watching myself," she says. "You've got your own ugly mug staring back at you and it's a jarring sensation. I always think I'm like a man. I suppose I'm more of a tomboy that the girly-girl which is why I can never walk in stilettos very well. I look drunk."

She certainly packs a punch in her latest role, playing Guinevere as a guerilla leader in the £90m blockbuster King Arthur. She trained for three months by boxing, weightlifting, axe-fighting, sword-fighting and horse-riding to prepare for the part.

When she wasn't filming, she was in the gym. "I did actually put on more muscle for the role, and that was the main aim," she explains. "When I accepted the part it was on the condition that I put on as much weight as possible. I did go up a dress size, which I was very proud of. I would have liked to have kept it going, but it would have meant two hours in the gym four times a week and I just couldn't be bothered."

There has been much talk - and a lot of photographs published - of the skimpy leather outfit she wears in the climactic battle sequence. Knightley says they spent months perfecting what she was going to wear. "Originally, we had Guinevere in full armour, but then we wondered where would she get that armour?," she says.

"The outfit isn't as skimpy as it appears. I actually had much more on than most of the guys - they were only in loincloths. But we did have to make sure that I could move around in it without anything popping out. And it was all lined with fabric, so there wasn't any chaffing.

"It's the perfect way to wear leather. I was fine because we did it at the height of summer in Ireland last year and it was really hot. I could do whatever I wanted to in it and all the boys were dying in their armour. When I think about it, I got off pretty easy."

She'll be seen next in The Jacket, opposite Adrien Brody, Kris Kristofferson and Jennifer Jason Leigh. She describes it as "a thinking man's thriller" and very different to King Arthur. A sequel to Pirates Of The Caribbean is also in the works.

Before that, Knightley is booked to play Elizabeth Bennet in a new screen version of Pride And Prejudice. "It's a fantastic opportunity, just as it was to play Guinevere," she says. "They're both strong female roles that if they come your way, you don't turn them down."

A close-knit family and friend group has helped the 19-year-old keep her head on straight during her sudden success. And she's bought herself a Mayfair flat - which she shares with model boyfriend Jamie Dornan, 22 - "so if the acting thing falls apart at least I'll have a flat".

As for a move to Hollywood, she says only if it was absolutely critical for her career, although she can't imagine it would ever be.

"I do like it in Los Angeles. The weather's good and the beaches are nice," she says. "When I first arrived, I couldn't get my head around it. I really didn't like it and wasn't sure why. I think it's possibly because it's very spread out and I'm used to built-up cities.

"A lot of people say LA is a city without culture, but if you look for it you can find it. I like visiting, but don't know if I could actually live there. I'm kind of happy where I am."

* King Arthur (12A) opens in cinemas today.

Published: 29/07/2004