Troutspotting

Ewan McGregor stars in this week's big movie premiere, Trainspotting. He's one of Britain's most bankable actors. Yet a few years ago he was appearing in something very different!

When you're up to your waist in freezing cold water and keeping a wary eye on several thousand wriggling trout, dreams of becoming a Hollywood actor must be very comforting.

And that's just what kept Ewan McGregor going as he worked on a fish farm as a teenager in Scotland. He progressed to being a car valet, a tractor driver and a barman in dozens of bars and restaurants. Anything to earn a bit of pocket money to pay his way through drama school.

Now after hit movies such as Trainspotting, Brassed Off and Shallow Grave, a starring role in Dennis Potter's Lipstick on Your Collar and a one-off appearance in ER, 26-year-old Ewan is a superstar, in demand on both sides of the Atlantic.

Friends and colleagues all rate him as a nice guy, yet he's frequently cast as the edgy baddie or a man with drink or drug problems. 'People see you in something like Trainspotting and they mentally typecast you - it's inevitable,' Ewan says.

But the image is changing. In the recently released A Life Less Ordinary, a romantic comedy co-starring Cameron Diaz, Ewan sings and dances. And he admits he'd love to make a musical.

'The nearest I've come is a glam-rock movie I've just made called Velvet Goldmine (for release in 1998). In the concert numbers I was able to be a rock star for a while. I've always sung - in the bath, mostly. But it was lovely to do it on film. And dancing with Cameron was wonderful. A real change from playing the bastard!'

Ewan still remembers when he was bitten by the showbiz bug - when his actor uncle Denis Lawson arrived home in the town of Crieff in Perthshire. 'He wore sheepskin waistcoats and beads, with long hair and no shoes. He'd give you flowers... and I'd think: "Who is this man? He's incredible!"

'The other thing that impressed me were all those black and white Hollywood and Ealing Studios' films. James Cagney and Jimmy Stewart movies, or anything slushy. Musicals on TV, I couldn't stop watching them.

'I also loved pantomimes. I was obsessed with the principal boy's legs. It had a lot to do with sex, and fishnet stockings. I always felt sexy when I was in the theatre, and always fell in love with the actresses as a child. It's a very sexy profession.'

He persuaded his parents to let him drop out of school at the age of 16. 'They did it for my happiness and my sanity. A week later I got a job in the stage crew at Perth Repertory Theatre.'

Uncle Denis, already an established star, didn't pull strings for Ewan. 'He'd have been mortified if I had,' Denis says. 'We've never worked together, and we want to,' he continues. 'So next year I'm planning to direct Ewan on stage, in a revival of the black comedy Little Malcolm And His Struggle Against The Eunuchs.'

Early in 1998, Denis will be appearing with Pauline Collins in a new BBC drama series, The Ambassadress. But he's even more excited about Ewan playing the young Obi-Wan Kenobe [sic] - Alec Guinness' character - in the Star Wars prequel.

'I was in all three original films,' Denis says. 'As a fighter pilot called Wedge who wore a huge helmet. Blink and you'll miss me! But now Ewan is in the new film, it's like handling on the baton, somehow.'

Ewan married French production designer Eve Mavrakis two years ago after they met on the set of Kavanagh QC. They're the proud parents of of 20-month-old Clara Matilde, and have just moved to a new home in St John's Wood, North London, which reputedly cost £1.25 million.

Ewan continues: 'I can remember what the Star Wars movies were like when they came out the first time, and I can imagine what they'll mean to Clara when she's older. I hope she'll be proud of her dad.

'I love watching myself up on the screen. I love it because I'm so proud to be up there. I still can't believe it. It's fantastic.'

And it's obviously better than watching trout!

Phil Penfold & Sara Lambert.