Actress Peta Wilson comes bounding into the quiet hotel room and plops on the green couch. Her blonde hair waves in the breeze she has created and she leans forward, her dark glasses obscuring her eyes.

The Australian star of La Femme Nikita and the coming Showtime miniseries A Girl Thing jumps up, tucks her feet under her and announces that the trick of her trade is finding a balance.

`What happens is actors get off balance because they’re playing characters all the time. Then, who are they? I’m an actress, I’m not a method actress, I’ll do it in the moment. I’ll get angry about something — but I’m like cowboys and Indians, cops and robbers — like when you were a kid.... Which is a much healthier way to go. Basically you’re the painter, you’re the paint and you’re the canvas.’

She and her family — her father was with the military — lived in New Guinea until she was 8, an upbringing that still shows in her broad, expressive hands and restless movements.

`We had a wonderful life, lived in native communities. And my brother and I were the only white children and so loved because of our differences. It was great. No TV. We had radio and eight-tracks and we used to sing. I’d do impersonations of I Dream of Jeannie,’‘ she said, giggling.

`When I’d go to Australia to see my grandparents I’d watch TV. We had a very good country life. We were wild, fresh, obedient children. Our mother and father were good parents. Young. At school I was very athletic and very studious. If I liked the teacher, I wanted to learn what they had to teach me.’

Wilson is still learning. She’s still not sure what she wants to do with her life, except have a '`beautiful husband and beautiful children. That should be enough, that’s kind of why we’re here,’‘ she said.

`But at 20 you’re young. (At 20) I said, ‘That’s what I want but I’m from a different generation and that’s not how people think anymore.’ I wasn’t sure what to do, so I went to study at drama school. I did it in America because nobody knew me. But I felt that acting was so narcissistic. It’s fine to take my family and make a fool of myself in front of (them) and my friends but actually doing it as a living,’‘ she said, wagging her head.

`Some of the actors I’ve met were kind of strange and didn’t really see outside themselves, how beautiful the day was and what someone else (thought).

When she arrived in Hollywood she drove a ’58 Thunderbird (she likes to work on old cars) and had packed all her clothes in the back. She had saved up $12,000 from earlier modeling jobs and investments in houses with her brother.

`So if it didn’t happen, I could just open a fish and chip shop,’‘ she said, laughing. '`I didn’t expect that I would still be in America. That was 10 years ago and I’m still here. I went on walk-about and haven’t gone back. I mean, I go home, but I’m still on walkabout.

Wilson, 40, [note: their mistake not mine] took to America immediately.

`It was very interesting and I fell in love with this beautiful English-Irishman named Damian Harris. He’s a writer-director. He’s Richard Harris’ son, and I fell madly in love with him. We moved in together. We lived together and he totally inspired me.... I was in love in Los Angeles and created my own school. I went to school every day, studied with teachers, used my savings, did little modeling jobs — the May Company or pregnancy jobs, it didn’t matter — to get myself through drama school. And he took me out to nice dinners, and we would go to the movies and had a nice life.’

USA’s La Femme Nikita, which is back this winter with eight new episodes, came along and altered that '`nice life.’‘

`That show took 16 or 17 hours of my day,’‘ she said. '`And he stayed and he stayed and he stayed, but it’s exhausting. When I came home I was exhausted, we would go out to dinner and people would recognize me everywhere, he didn’t really get that personal time with me.

`And I had no choice because I was in a contract and that’s what I had to do, and there was 180 people relying on me, and they all had wives and families and he loved me very much. It was one of those unfortunate stories, and who knows what’s going to happen. We broke apart a few months ago. I’m now taking some time to think about that because I loved him very much....’

- Luaine Lee