Okay, Smart Guy

And what was it about Moore that led him to give up all that youthful freedom and studly potential to become a twenty-something husband with three stepdaughters?

"When you find it," he says, "you'll know."

Devil's Advocate

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As Ashton Kutcher sees it, life is good these days.

"I've already achieved more than I ever expected," he says, spreading out his arms. "Anything else is a bonus."

In addition to "The Guardian," Kutcher has a second movie opening Friday: In "Open Season," an animated film, he's Elliot, the wisecracking mule deer who serves as companion to a lost grizzly bear. He also has a cameo role this fall in Emilio Estevez's film "Bobby," about the assassination of Robert Kennedy. (Stoned again in that one, this time on LSD.)

"He is a leading man, make no mistake," Costner says. "How he develops, I think, will be based on the scripts he chooses. Because he'll be known for the movies then, and not for being Ashton."

But Ashton is already a Hollywood commodity -- he's produced two of his own movies and has a strong relationship with MTV, which developed his popular show "Punk'd" and is working with him on other projects as well.

"He's really articulate and very smart and completely collaborative," says Rod Aissa, senior vice president for talent and series development at MTV. "It's nice that the world is catching up to what he's always been."

On the surface, "Punk'd" seems like a practical joke writ large, a realization of the public desire to capture celebrities "as they really are."

Not so, Kutcher says. "Punk'd," he explains, is about exploring human nature. And while having a successful "punk" is the goal, what he really loves is when he fails.

Take, for example, his favorite episode, involving Seattle Seahawks tailback Shaun Alexander. (Spoiler alert: It hasn't aired yet. Skip ahead to avoid finding out what happens.) Kutcher followed him to a charity event and set up a joke that both (a) had Alexander dealing with a snotty kid who claimed soccer players were better than football players and (b) switched the $5,000 check that was to be donated in Alexander's name for a $500,000 check.

Alexander, in response, promised to hook the kid up with a soccer star he knew. And, on the spot, agreed to cover the extra $495,000.

"Think about that!" Kutcher raves. "Everybody's jerk reaction when something bad happens is to flip out on somebody else, lose their cool or whatever it is," Kutcher says, "and I'm really so honestly impressed with anyone who goes, 'Okay, this is happening. Let me be generous in this situation. Let me be generous when somebody's taking my dignity or slashing my ego or taking my car or burning my house down or stealing my dogs or blaming me for something I didn't do. Let me be generous in this moment.'"

A photographer arrives, starts snapping pictures. The publicist is anxious. Everything is behind schedule. Kutcher's due on the red carpet in just over an hour.

"I've gotta go rub elbows with politicians tonight," Kutcher says, clearly not thrilled. "I'm really uncomfortable being in the same city as George Bush. Is he in town right now?"

His publicist tries to ward off any talk of politics, but Kutcher's not listening. He points out that Bruce Willis (Moore's ex) has offered a $1 million bounty on Osama bin Laden. Given the widespread global anger toward the United States over the Iraq war, he says he feels Washington probably isn't a safe place, especially when the president is here. He starts talking about Shiites and Sunnis; the United States and its relationship with Saudi Arabia. But it's all coming back to his original point -- there are haters on both sides.

"You're safer having a beer with Osama bin Laden than being in this town right now," he says.

The publicist is now apoplectic. She's talking about calls from CNN, blow-up quotes, all the potential damage control that might come her way.

Kutcher just smiles that slow, sexy grin. He knows exactly what he's just done. And he's perfectly okay with it.

In fact, just for good measure, he says it again.