Beautiful People 2004: Justin Kirk

Some might say that Justin Kirk has had a lot of luck. After all, he made his Broadway debut in Frank Gilroy's Any Given Day in 1993, shortly after he moved to New York City. Nine months later, he was cast as one of the leads in Terrence McNally's acclaimed Love! Valour! Compassion!, which went on to win several Tony awards. "We were psyched long before we started production on that one," Kirk explains. "We knew it was going to be big even before it became a hit." The actor then landed a high-profile slot on the WB's Jack & Jill and became a dreamboat for tweens. Now the 34-year-old is basking in the after-glow from his latest triumph, a starring role as an AIDS sufferer in HBO's Golden Globe-winning production of Tony Kushner's Angels in America. "For my generation, Angels is the play of our lifetime," he says. "I felt a burden while making it that didn't go away until the last day of the shoot."

Lucky or not, Kirk has been working hard all his life to get where he is, having made his theatrical debut at the age of seven in a production of Bertolt Brecht's The Caucasian Chalk Circle. After dropping out of college, he enrolled at the Circle in the Square Conservatory, moonlighting as a bellhop at the Royalton Hotel to pay the rent. Then came his big breaks. "I wish I could say that I chose the roles I got," he states unassumingly. "But somehow they just came my way." Today he lives alone in the Hollywood Hills, mulling over the myriad possibilities that his success has provided. As for the future, he says cheerfully, "I'm trepidatious and excited at the same time." At this he laughs, letting you know that whatever comes next, it's going to be great.

* Justin wears a Jacket by Hugo Boss, shirt by Burberry, jeans by G-Star.