Jennifer Love Hewitt: Love Lessons

Q: Maybe you'd get more respect if you changed your name to something like J. Love.

A: If someone said I was trying to follow in Jennifer Lopez's footsteps, I would only say thank you. I think J. Lo's succeeded amazingly. She's one of the hardest-working people, if not the hardest-working person, I've ever seen. I have respect for her.

Q: How do the lyrics reveal who you are?

A: I'm a really insecure person. Most people don't know this. I really wanted to write about what that feels like. I think it's important for people to know. People get a misconception that if you're successful at something, you have it made and that somehow you're not human. I'm insecure every single day.

Q: Some of the once-hottest actors of your generation are struggling these days. You're thriving. What's your survival strategy?

A: When you're young and in the entertainment industry, there are lots of things you can choose and sometimes you just want to do everything. Unfortunately, that doesn't always guarantee longevity and people get sick of you really, really quick. I don't want that to happen. That's why I'm trying to be more selective about what I do. It's frustrating, though, because I think, "I haven't worked in four months, what's wrong with me?" I have to remind myself that I'm waiting for that one thing that's gonna change people's minds.

Q: For someone as work-oriented as you, downtime must seem scary.

A: Having worked 12 months a year on "Party of Five" and "Time of Your Life," I thought that I wasn't successful if I wasn't. working all the time. It's been hard on me.

Q: Do you ever think, "Why can't I have Julia Roberts's career?"

A: When I'm insecure, I would love to be Julia Roberts or Cameron Diaz. There are a list of people I wish I could be every other day. But then I think about whether I would be really happy if I traded and, no, I wouldn't. I wouldn't be me.

Q: Do you think some people perceive you as just perky?

A: Happy people get a raw deal. If you're a happy person, people think you're not really deep, you're not intelligent, you don't have deep-seated emotions. I'm a happy person and I'm very grateful, but I've also been sad in my life. I'm also a deep, complex person. I don't get a chance to show that very often because people don't allow it.

Q: You've long been mentioned to star in the romantic comedy Why Can't I Be Audrey Hepburn?, about a girl dumped at the altar who finds love with a guy who loves Hepburn almost as much as the heroine does. What's going on?

A: It's going through one of its last rewrites. It isn't attached to a studio, but half the money is in place and we're just trying to find the rest.

Q: Having played such a beloved and inimitable star as Audrey Hepburn in a TV movie, haven't people warned you to leave the legend alone?

A: Oh, of course I've heard that. But this movie is just so something I have to do. After this movie, I will probably let the Audrey Hepburn thing go, but it keeps coming back to me in my life and I feel it keeps coming back for a reason. The universe has told me that I'm not done with that whole thing yet.

Q: Who do you think you'd have chemistry with on-screen?

A: Sandra Bullock and I would do really well playing sisters, but that's probably bold of me to say. Oh, and Matt Damon.

Q: Are you friends with a lot of famous actors?

A: I don't know any really super-famous people. My friends who are famous will read this and say, "Hey, what about us?" But I don't know Tom Cruise or Julia Roberts or people like that. I get shy around very famous people because I automatically think that they probably have never even heard of me. When I meet someone very famous, I try not to say too much so that they have an out to just move on if they don't really want to spend time with me.

Q: What scares you most?

A: Failing terrifies me. Failing other people and failing myself, too, in anything. The times I feel like I've failed the most are when my friends call me and it takes two or three days for me to call them back. I get sick to my stomach. I feel like a failure when I think I'm letting my family and friends down. If I've gone a week without seeing my brother, I feel like I've failed because I haven't stayed true to what my heart really needs. Q: Have you ever experienced God close-up?

A: My mom's pretty close to it. I've seen parts of God in her.

Q: What disgusts you?

A: Someone who isn't grateful drives me nuts.

Q: What's missing in your life?

A: My heart is full. I have the greatest friends, a family I love, I just got to make a record I really love. I'm getting ready to force people to listen to it. I have a great movie coming out that I am proud of. But if I had to say what I immediately lack, it would be an amazing film to be able to show people that I'm not just somebody who can wear short skirts.

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