‘World’s sexiest man’ Bradley Cooper swaps playboy for Playbook

HIS time as the ‘World’s Sexiest Man’ might have expired but Bradley Cooper couldn’t care less - he has a potential Oscar in his sights.

Bradley Cooper is exhausted. It’s his eyes that give him away: the twinkly blues are looking a little bloodshot, but then he has flown into London for a day of back-to-back interviews before shooting off to resume filming on The Hangover III.

It was his turn as the charismatic Phil in the original Hangover that turned him into a global star and, three years on, he has little trouble getting back into Phil’s headspace.

“I grow my hair out and bam - I’m there,” says the 37-year-old, laughing.

But he’s not perched on a chair ready to talk about the new Hangover escapades (that’ll come next year). Right now he’s promoting Silver Linings Playbook, in which he plays Pat Solitano, a man who has lost everything - his wife, house, job - and has just spent eight months in a state institution for bi-polar treatment.

A graduate of the esteemed Actors Studio Drama School in New York, Cooper takes his work seriously, which is why he finds talk of his heart-throb status (he was voted People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive last year) so uncomfortable.

He insists he’s just a regular bloke. “One of the things I love doing is to go to a theatre and watch a movie by myself. My life’s very normal. The only time it gets kind of interesting is in these types of situations.”

So forget asking him about his pin-up status; he’s far more interested in talking about his craft. “I just feel I hit the jackpot with Silver Linings Playbook,” he admits.

The toughest shoot of his career, not least because he’s in almost every scene, Cooper remembers the exhaustion he felt at the end of each day.

He recalls, “Oh man, it was like I would just crawl into bed.”

But worth it.

• Silver Linings Playbook is on release now