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Return to part one of our interview with Ashton Kutcher.
Nikki has his way with women but doesn't really consider their perspective all the time. Is he a stud or just a douchebag?
There's a thing for actors that I learned from an acting coach a while ago: You never judge your character. Because nobody considers themselves a douchebag. From an external point of view, if I was looking at this guy and I was going, "All right, I just met this guy, I don't know who you are," I go, "Yeah, he's a bit of a douchebag." From an internal point of view, I look at the character and I go, "He's a guy doing what he has to do to survive and not necessarily doing it the right way." So I try not to judge people in my life. But I definitely don't think he's a stud. I think that he's a tactical charm artist.
But I know what you're saying, and I think guys and girls see this movie very differently. 'Cause all my buddies were like, "This guy's just a douche! Why are you playing this douche?" And I think the thing that guys may have when they see this movie is the fear that women are gonna assume that all guys that are trying to pick up girls are like this. [I think] women have a greater discernment than that, they're going to be able to see the good guy … and this movie will give good guys a greater shot because women are going to be able to [spot] the guys that are out for something else.
You also produced "Beauty and the Geek" and "True Beauty." Why are you so intrigued by this intersection of looks and personality?
I think I'm publicly considered to be a good-looking person, but I believe that I as a person have more substance than just that. And I believe that a lot of times I'm judged on that, and a lot of times other people are judged on the way that they look, be it good or be it bad. And that the substance of the person is oftentimes overlooked. I think highlighting the substance of people and who they are as individuals—and that everybody hurts and everybody feels pain and everybody struggles in some way, shape or form—creates a unity, as opposed to a judgment that is separating.
You have a huge presence on Twitter. What's something no one should ever tweet about?
I just think that drunk tweeting is ill-advised. Once you're drunk, you gotta make sure that you're not on Twitter. If you go out to the bar and you come home at night, don't tweet. Drunk tweeting is just as bad as drunk dialing.
Is that something you've learned from experience?
I've had a couple drinks and tweeted before. And then I went back and I looked and I was like, "Ah, you know what, I probably shouldn't have tweeted that." Because sometimes when you're trying to condense things to 140 characters, you really gotta use that tactical part of your mind to make sure that you're communicating what you want to communicate in the right way. When you're drunk you really don't have the discernment of, "Wow, I could see how they could see that the wrong way," and you write things that aren't fully thought out.
So when you tweet "I'm naked running up and down Hollywood Boulevard..."
I think that's fine.
That would be acceptable?
Yeah, I think that's all right. If you're naked and running up and down Hollywood Boulevard, I think it's all right.
But then you have to do it.
Oh, yeah, if you're not doing it you shouldn't tweet it.
It's hard to send a tweet and run around naked at the same time.
Nah, you can tweet from your phone. Piece of cake.
So you can do this all at once?
I'm gifted. I can run naked and tweet at the same time.
