By E.C. Gladstone , Photographs: Daniela Federici

ome actors follow their careers as their agents and managers advise them to, choosing projects that will bring them greater fame, acclaim or money. Others take roles—whether film, television or stage—for the exotic adventure, for the opportunity to work with people who will enrich or influence their lives or simply to see something worthwhile brought to life. Saffron Burrows is that second type. As much as the stunning ex-model with high-caliber dramatic ability could be a leading lady in big-budget productions, Burrows seems to be driven more by a "see what happens" mindset, in her personal life as well as her career.

This might explain why, after meeting at the low-key Hollywood hotspot Jones On Third on a crisp Saturday afternoon, Burrows—glamorous as ever in simply a long black dress, boots and barely any makeup—is happy to change venues when I say I'd really like a beer. "Let's find a pub, then," she says, and without a second thought, we're off in my car to Tom Bergin's ale house, where I can partake while she sticks to tea. It also explains why Burrows is as interested in indulging a writer's whims and asking him about his life as she is in discussi ng her own, which has been filled with edgy work like The Loss of Sexual Innocenceand Timecode, classy period pieces including Troyand Klimtand mainstream fare such as Deep Blue Seaand her aptly cast new role as lawyer Lorraine Weller on TV's hot Boston Legal.

VEGAS: We have to get something straight. Half the websites about you have your birthday in January, and the other half say October. Which is it?

SAFFRON BURROWS: [Laughs] It's October 22nd, '73. And funny enough, I was onset in New York this past January, and we'd just come back from the Christmas break, and they had a cake and sang. I had to say, sorry! And it transpired that the director, Amy Redford [daughter of Robert], has the same birthday, not the same year but the same date. That was lovely; you travel across the world and you meet someone and you just click.

What were you working on?

We made this film together called The Guitar. It was a fantastic way to spend the winter because I was filming in New York and I was also shooting The Bank Jobin London with a New Zealand director [Roger Donaldson], who kindly let me out so I could do both. I've never done this before. I began one for six weeks and went and did Amy's for six weeks, and went back and completed. The characters were fantastically different. We get to go on these adventures... But I must say I'm strange. I'm naturally quite a cautious person, and then I have a hidden adventurer inside of me, often very reluctant to embark, longing for home and security, and then making these forays into the world, and when I come home I feel triumphant, like a sailor. You must have been on some great adventures?

I have a bit, but I've found it's one thing to go as a tourist and another to go into the underground of a city and be invited in.

That's the thing that we're all seeking as travelers, isn't it, not to be a tourist? And if you're working, you get a bit of that. I once did a play in Paris, and it was such a lovely experience because all the wonderful French actors really respect each other. They go and see each other's work a lot. So Isabelle Huppert and all the Parisian theater people came, and I thought, Gosh, it would be hard to be in Paris again not in that context ...

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