The South African star, Charlize Theron speaks confidently; explaining her love for the art of acting to the table of 10 reporters who have congregated at the Ritz-Carlton in Berlin.

“I still believe that the job of an actor is to ‘disappear’. It’s about the canvas of the story, and not about thinking, ‘Oh, what do I get to play in this movie?’” says Theron, responding to the question of whether the “seductive Charlize” is back in the movie Hancock.

“I don’t think of my work in that compartmentalized way. I’m a lover of good material and I like things that break the whole rule of thumb of what genre is.

“But thank you for saying I was seductive,” she says with a smile.

In Hancock, Theron plays Mary Embrey, the wife of PR Executive Ray Embrey, who is saved by Hancock from what would have been a gruesome train versus car incident. Ray insists on bringing Hancock into the family as he works on improving the superhero’s image in the public eye, but Mary is reluctant to let him in, insisting that he is a lost cause.

The script for Hancock ; Theron’s says she had to do it because it was a brilliant story.

“The first thing I thought when I read it was ‘When was the last time we created a new superhero?’ That’s pretty cool. Let’s take the image of a superhero and turn it upside down. As a story I thought that was really intriguing and original.”

“Acting can’t be mechanical. There isn’t a recipe for anything in the arts, it’s creativity. If we could explain, manufacture and duplicate it, it would not be art.”

A subject to Theron is that of beauty. Loosely connecting Theron with her turning down of the role of a Bond girl, a reporter asks, “Don’t you think that people want to watch you because you’re just so beautiful?”

Her response is quick. “Have you seen Monster? People watched that. People went and saw that, it’s probably my most successful film ever. After that, you could never tell me I’m too pretty for a role.”

“I have been lucky to find roles in my career in which I was in control of the defining process, the material didn’t define me. I’m not going to let the way I look get in the way of telling a good story.”

Theron replies: “My decision to not be a Bond girl wasn’t because I don’t want to be a Bond girl. I would take on the role tomorrow if I felt like I wanted to service that story.”

Theron will be starring in a thriller The Road and The Italian Job called The Brazilian Job. The drama The Burning Plain, which she stars with Kim Basinger, is set to be released in 2009.