George Clooney

He's sporting a five day stubble growth and trying to shake off a severe flu bug - having spent the past five days holed up in his hotel room - but even under such debilitating circumstances 'Gorgeous George' Clooney still comes close to a pretty perfect specimen of mankind.

"I've got some sort of chest bug," he apologises. "But I'm battling back, it's just nice to be out in public again."

Nice too for the millions of female fans who can't get enough of the 39-year old star.

Many were distraught when he quit the hit medical drama ER, which catapulted him to fame and fortune. But since then the versatile star has proved he's more than just a good looking TV doctor with a clutch of successful Hollywood movies behind him, including Out of Sight and Three Kings.

His latest, The Perfect Storm, has just been released, and if he's feeling a little delicate with flu right right now it's nothing to what he and his co-star Mark Wahlberg went through during the gruelling four-month shoot.

Based on a true story, the movie tells the harrowing tale of Halloween night in 1991 when a group of Massachusetts fishermen lost their lives at sea after three raging weather fronts unexpectedly collided to produce the fiercest storm in modern history.

Although much of the catastrophic action has been recreated using computer graphics it still called for Clooney and the crew to spend the best part of the shoot up to their necks in water.

"We were on the water for 12 hours a day for about four months. Every day it would be like 'we cannot be wet one more day,'" he recalls with a grimace.

"We'd get up at seven in the morning and you'd get there and you'd have to get in the water tank. I have this photo of Mark and I standing between takes and we look like we couldn't be more miserable," he adds laughing.

Despite this the buoyant star did manage to find his sea legs, which is more than can be said for his co-star Mark Wahlberg.

"Only one of us - and it wasn't me - got seasick and he threw up longer than anyone I'd ever seen throw up in my life," he laughs. "We were doing a scene where we have a big fight in the wheelhouse, it was a pretty rough day out on the water and Mark was just green. It wasn't between every take, it was between every line he would throw up," he adds.

Clooney, who plays the boat's skipper Captain Billy Tyne, was not only up against the elements but also the local community of Gloucester, Massachusetts, where the family and friends of the dead men still live.

"That was tough," he says looking thoughtful. "Because we're telling a story that is about real people, but we're making up what happened because no one knows as they never found the boat. So we're sort of portraying these people that existed but we're not really portraying the people.

"The tricky part about doing this is that we're walking a very fine line between entertainment and also dealing with real people, so you can't just go 'my ex-wife's an idiot,' because that lady actually lives in this town and she will be forever in trouble or made fun of for a comment like that."

Clooney's rough and ready portrayal of Billy Tyne is about as far removed from ER's smooth-talking Dr Doug Ross as you can get but the star says he hasn't deliberately set out to cast off the mantle of his phenomenal success.

"I don't think you can ever shake off a character in a show that was as popular as that was worldwide," he says. "As opposed to swimming up stream trying to fight it, you just accept that as part of your life and it was a big part of my life.

"The lucky thing is that I didn't get completely pigeon-holed into that being the only thing I will ever do. Most people who work in films are out of a TV series. I enjoyed the show and was very proud of it."

What he does seem more eager to shake off is the 'Sexiest Man Alive' tag which has been bestowed on him time and time again.

"I don't like it because when I get older and things start falling apart then they're like OK, you're a character actor," he says modestly.

And what's more he seems indifferent about his looks, saying they have neither hindered nor helped his career.

"I don't want to sound like a jackass," he smiles, "but I just think I get good roles. I have managed to get good jobs for the last few years in spite of whatever that is, so I don't really have any complaints. I am in a very good place in my life and career right now. I don't think that there is anything that is a hindrance. I manage to keep getting jobs and jobs that I am proud of."

But although his professional life might be going swimmingly, the same can't be said for his love life at the moment.

After one failed marriage and his recent split from long-term partner French law student Celine Balitran, the world's most eligible bachelor seems to like nothing more than spending time with a bunch of hard-drinking mates and his potbellied pig.