Like a flash from the flatlands of Iowa, farmhand turned model turned actor Ashton Kutcher is racing toward star status in Hollywood. It all happened as if by magic. After placing first in 1997's Fresh Face of Iowa modeling contest, agents flew him to New York. The very next day he was working the runway in Bryant Park. During his first trip to Milan, he booked 19 shows. One year later, on his first day in Los Angeles, he was cast in the Fox sitcom That '70s Show, which went on to become a Nielsen smash. His first attempt at movie stardom, the stoner comedy Dude, Where's My Car?, went bong! at the box office, grossing over $100 million worldwide since its release in December. Oh, and he's still only 23.
All this makes Kutcher the young star of the moment, destined to become the next Keanu or Leonardo. Will success spoil him? "I don't have time to be overwhelmed," says Kutcher, wearing a knit cap and sipping a Coke at the Paramount Hotel. "I'm pretty hyperactive and what I love to do more than anything is work. I probably work 16 hours a day, whether it's on the show or reading a script that someone sent me or doing publicity for other stuff I've done. I'm too busy doing the next thing."
Which happens to be the film Texas Rangers, in which he and fellow teen heartthrob James Van Der Beek take on a gang of Mexican bandits. But long days filming in the wilderness of the Canadian West brought out Kutcher's decidedly un-Hollywood upbringing. "I spent most of my time with the wranglers, helping them herd the cattle," he notes. "I've spent a lot of time with animals."
He's not just talking about house pets. Ashton, his fraternal twin brother, Michael, and older sister Tausha moved to the country in junior high school, when their parents divorced. His rural hometown -- Homestead, Iowa (population 100) -- offered unusual career opportunities for the young workaholic. "During wrestling season, the only job I could find was skinning deer for the butcher," he recalls. "When you live in the country you can always find something to do. So you kind of pop from job to job, whether it's cutting the nuts off cattle one day or baling hay the next."
Crisis struck when Michael, then 13, contracted cardiomyopathy, a coronary condition caused by a virus. "It breaks down the muscle in your heart and creates a hole in it," explains Kutcher. "They gave him about six hours to live and then they found a new heart for him. My brother is my hero. If he can survive that, I can do anything."
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