But when Julia Stiles walks on screen, you know that her character has a brain and is going to use it.
The effect is the same when I meet Julia at an Italian restaurant in the heart of Hollywood.
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Julia Stiles in the Bourne Ultimatum with Matt DamonIf you're looking for Hollywood comparisons, think Jodie Foster, with a touch of Meryl Streep.
All took time out from acting to get degrees from Ivy League colleges, and all three are highly respected in an industry that likes to "sexify" actresses.
To maintain her growing reputation, Julia, 26, has a plan.
First, she will continue to live in New York, where she grew up (she started acting on stage there when she was ten) and attended Columbia University.
Second, she will continue to develop a shadow career as a writer, director and producer.
Finally, she will seek out movies and plays that value a woman's intelligence over her body.
"My work is important to me," says Julia.
"Sometimes a great role will come up ? but if it calls for nudity I don't want to do it.
"Clips end up as porn on the internet. What if my dentist sees them?"
She's joking, but there's a serious edge to her comment. "I'm not on the paparazzi's radar,"she says, "and I hope I never am because it's hard to turn that ship around."
One reason photographers aren't trailing her is that, for Julia, having fun does not mean going out and partying, she explains.
"My idea of a good time is reading all the books I want without having to write an essay on them.
"It's getting to travel and hang out with my friends and spend time on all the movies I want to make.
"I have my fair share of fun, but not so I can be written up in the press."
Not being your typical Hollywood personality, it amuses her that she is so often mistaken for gossip magnet Kirsten Dunst.
"People come up to me and say, 'Oh, you were great in Spiderman'", she says.
The two blond actresses did share the screen once, in the 2003 movie Mona Lisa Smile with Julia Roberts.
And they both fought for the child vampire role in the 1994 film Interview with the Vampire. Kirsten won and Julia holds no grudge.
"I would have started working in films too soon," she says.
"I'm glad I had a normal high-school experience. If I'd done Spiderman my life would be incredibly different.
Whereas with the Bourne films, luckily my character has brown hair, so it's hard for audiences to connect her with me."
Julia has played CIA operative Nicky in The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy and now the latest in the series, The Bourne Ultimatum ? all based on the Robert Ludlum thrillers and starring Matt Damon as the enigmatic Jason Bourne.
Being less famous than Kirsten Dunst might mean smaller pay cheques but, as Julia says, she has no mortgage and no children.
A stylist? Forget it. Today she is wearing a floaty patterned top and close-fitting trousers.
"I'm making a concerted effort to present myself better than I did at college," she says. "But I'm not really up on fashion."
Maybe that's why she seems utterly cool, confident and just a little mysterious. No wonder Paul Greengrass, who directed her in The Bourne Ultimatum, was intrigued.
"There's something ambiguous about Julia," he says. Ask her what he means and she says, "It's always good for a character to have secrets ? you want to think about what your character is withholding."
In the first two Bourne films, Julia's character was barely on screen.
But in this one, she has more interaction with Jason Bourne, who is still suffering from amnesia, still trying to find out who wants him dead and why, and unsure whether he can trust the CIA.
"My part got more complicated," she says.
"Treadstone, the operation Nicky has been working for, has become questionable morally.
"She has a problem with that and is forced to decide whether to stay in the CIA or not.
"Ultimately she realises that she and Bourne can trust each other."
Asked if there is any romance between them, Julia says obliquely, "It's not what you'd expect."
Julia's most successful films have been ones where she is allowed to be the aggressor.
In Save the Last Dance, she moved from ballet to hip-hop and learned how to fit into a multicultural neighbourhood.
In The Business of Strangers, she got the better of her boss, Stockard Channing.
In The Prince and Me, she chose to be a doctor rather than a princess.
And in her first hit, the 1999 film 10 Things I Hate About You ? a modern take on Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew ? she got to show off her beauty and wit and still get the guy, Heath Ledger.
"It would be interesting," she says, "to play Kate again in the real Taming of the Shrew."
Julia starred in David Mamet's Oleanna in the West End three years ago.
"And I'd like to play Beatrice in Much Ado About Nothing."
Perhaps the reason Julia feels at home with Kate and Beatrice ? both feisty women ? is because she's like them.
"I was almost overly confident," she recalls of her early life, growing up in the bohemian SoHo district of Manhattan, where her mother Judith, an artist, had her own business and her father, John, was a teacher.
Julia has a sister, Jane, nine years younger, and brother, Johnny, 12 years younger.
"I probably spoke with more authority than I had. I have opinions, and I'm not afraid to express them."
While still in primary school, she wrote a letter to the mayor of New York complaining about the garbage-strewn streets and suggesting rubbish bins on the pavements.
And she credits her fourth-grade teacher with turning her into a political activist.
"She instilled in me the idea of giving back ? the idea that we're not on Earth alone."
A supporter of Habitat for Humanity, a non-government, nonprofit organisation that builds affordable homes using volunteer labour, Julia has twice gone to Costa Rica to help out on construction projects.
"I loved doing hands-on work, as opposed to just appearing at some celebrity benefit dinner or concert," she says. "I was very good at digging ditches."
Julia's acting plans began early. New York theatre director Bob McGrath, who gave Julia her first job when she was ten, recalls, "She wrote us a letter ? some of which was in crayon ? saying, ?If you have any parts for kids, I'll do them.? So I put her in some shows ? and kept putting her in shows until she was 17."
McGrath, who co-wrote a screenplay with Julia a few years ago, admires her outspokenness.
"Even as a child, she was very focused," he says.
"You forgot she was a kid. She could do anything. I think she could run a studio."
Julia would never be so bold as to agree, but she does say, "I started acting very young, and was very distracted by college.
"Now that I've graduated, I have more time to be more proactive about my career and ambitions."
She never considered not completing her English literature degree.
"I knew I'd regret it if I didn't go to college. I love acting and dressing up, but I'm also interested in what goes on behind the scenes."
After writing and directing her own 20-minute film, Julia can't wait to do more.
Raving, about a young woman who forms a bond with an older man, starred Zooey Deschanel and Bill Irwin and premiered this year in New York.
"It was the first time I'd worked on something that was my own vision," she says.
Julia has a boyfriend, Jonathan Cramer, a New York painter and sculptor whom she met at a party ("He's unique," she says. "You know the way children are when they look at the world, how they see everything as if it were for the first time? He's like that"), and she admits to wanting to have a family eventually, but says she isn't ready yet.
At the moment, she is focused on developing a movie based on Sylvia Plath's 1963 novel The Bell Jar. She recently obtained the movie rights, and will produce and star and choose the director.
"I really love the part of Esther Greenwood," Julia says of Plath's semi-autobiographical leading character, who struggles with depression and paranoia and eventually attempts suicide.
"Esther is a manic depressive. She experiences extreme highs and extreme lows. When she ultimately goes crazy, it's not like she's numb to the world. She's aware of everything."
The Bell Jar, which was filmed once before in the late 1970s, is an indictment of life in the 50s.
"Esther is extremely ambitious at a time when really the only avenue open to her is to become a wife and mother," Julia says.
She had already learned about this era when she made Mona Lisa Smile, in which her character chose marriage over law school.
"When we were filming that, I'd come home every day, blast out rock music and thank God for feminism," she says.
"No wonder the 60s happened. The 50s were so confining and restricted."
Yet she looks forward to exploring that period again, even if filming the negative aspects of Esther's life might be difficult.
"It's exhilarating to get lost in a character," she says.
"Ultimately it's cathartic. Sometimes Esther wakes up in the morning and says, ?What's the point?? I can exorcise that feeling by playing the role.
"I would never want to commit suicide," she adds, "but I have thought about it. I find it a very comforting feeling, when you're stressed out, to be able to say, ?I could walk in front of that bus right now.?"
Suddenly troubled by what she has suggested, Julia is careful to clarify what she meant.
"Why did I say that? I love my life. When you entertain an idea like that, it makes you appreciate everything you enjoy about life.
"When you feel you're in a rut or something's not going right, it reminds you of the power you have, and why it's very precious to be alive."
Which is, again, why she feels passionately that women must not let themselves be defined by their looks.
At nearly 5ft 8in, Julia is slender, "but I consciously try not to fall into the trap of having to be skinny," she says.
"I want to feel healthy, strong and alert. I'm not going to waste my time being distracted by trying to fit into a size zero.
"I wish women would realise they have more to offer the world than being emaciated."
She prefers hiking and swimming to gym work-outs.
In New York she can exercise anonymously, but when she visits Los Angeles she feels she is under a microscope.
"People just hang out by the pool. If I were to try to swim laps with my orange cap and goggles, that wouldn't go down very well. I'd appear on a blog somewhere." Now that's just the kind of fame she doesn't want.
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