Ever since playing Daniel Barenboim, Jacqueline du Pré's conductor husband in "Hilary and Jackie" with Emily Watson, life has been a whirl for the curly-haired, large-eyed thespian. After "Reindeer Games," he found himself in the not unenviable position of being Natalie Portmans romantic lead in "Where the Heart Is," and simultaneously committing to celluoid "Titus Andronicus," with Anthony Hopkins and Jessica Lang, and "Sunshine," a family saga spanning three generations and starring Ralph Fiennes, which is released in the UK this spring.

Besides Frain and Fiennes, the cast boasts Jennifer Ehle, Rachel Weisz and Miriam Margoyles, with Oscar-winning director Istvan Svabo, "I play Ralph's brother," says James, finally tucking into his food. "On set, Ralph was like an old-fashioned gentleman. He worked incredible hours and never looked tired or complained. He plays an Olympic fencing champion, so he had lessons every evening after filming. He was incredibly dedicated."

Frain himself is no stranger to hard work. "On 'Hilary and Jackie,' I tried to learn how to conduct three pieces of music exactly like Barenboim but it all ended up on the cutting-room floor. You never actually see me conduct anything at all, ever, only in one long shot where I could be anyone." Emily Watson had better luck. "She was great. I remember saying to her after she'd done one of her big multiple sclerosis scenes, 'You're really enjoying this, aren't you?', and her just smiling. It's every actor's dream to play someone with a chronic disability. It's the red carpet to the awards ceremony."

Frain's constant to-ing and fro-ing, however, has left him exhausted. "For the last four jobs I was flying between countries - a week here and a week there. It's been non-stop. I still have the same suitcase that I came out with. I have no clothes at all. It's a bit mad."

But it's not just his wardrobe that's suffering - his social life is too. "It's quite hard on friends and family when you work like this. I'm planning to take some time off now and catch up with people and myself. The highs are high and the lows are low in this business. You meet great people; you see amazing stuff in amazing places, and a lot of the time you have a really good laugh."

Especially it seems, with Ben Affleck: "I like Ben, he's really a good guy. He's smart and fun and laid-back and easy-going." A bit like Frain himself, by the sound of it. "I play very quietly. I'm not a loud nightclub type. All I ever seem to do in LA is drive. You get stuck in the traffic. Otherwise, you meet people in restaurants, lots of restaurants. Or you go to people's houses and have their dogs jump on you. Everyone has at least eight dogs here," he laughs. "It's security or something."

Born in Leeds but brought up in Essex, the eldest of eight children, James comes from a family sounding not unlike that other artistic dynasty the Fiennes, only younger. James is 31 yet his youngest sibling is only 13. But those old enough to have careers are already going the artistic way of Ralph, Martha, Joe, etc, comprising a sculptor, a stylist, a photographer and a graphic designer. "We were desperately hoping that one of them would want to be a banker or a lawyer or an engineer," James groans, "But the youngest has just announced she wants to be a writer." His parents are the only ones to diverge from this rule - his mother being a teacher and his father a City stockbroker. But for as long as James can remember, he wanted to act.

"It wasn't a sudden decision; it was always there," he remembers. "But it wasn't really a possibility. No one I had ever been to school with had acted. My parents had no actor friends. It was just like a fantasy, really," he laughs. "I used to run around very fast pretending to be the Bionic Man and looking at my feet as though they were in slow motion. I remember one day doing this in the middle of a playing field and ran, looking at my feet, straight into a netball post. Maybe that's when I made the decision to be an actor."

His determination paid off. Spotted straight out of the Central School of Speech and Drama, he was cast opposite Anthony Hopkins in Richard Attenborough's "Shadowlands" and hasn't looked back. In his six-year career [since Shadowlands, at] aged 25, James has been in some 15 films, from the Spanish ambassador in Elizabeth to the eponymous lead in Vigo, about the life of the consumptive French cineaste, a role for which James lost over 16 pounds.

But with all this success behind him and the plaudits that await him, all James is interested in at the moment is coming home. "I can't wait to hang out and go to the pub," he declares, his words in a bizarre mix of West Coast meets West End. And his future? "It's a long-term goal to be able to direct and produce," he says. "But who doesn't want to do that? In the land of dreams and plans, as oppossed to reality, I'd also like to write." At the rate Frain's going that shouldn't take too long.

YOU Magazine 2 January 2000

photographs: Mark Anderson