THERE was a point, somewhere around her spectacular box-office bombs of 2004, when Scarlett Johansson went from being one of Hollywood's hottest actresses to being, well, just hot when four box-office duds were added to her suddenly wobbly CV - The Perfect Score, A Love Song For Bobby Long, A Good Woman and In Good Company. Painful, each and every one.

And it got worse. As movies such as The Island, Scoop (both 2005), The Prestige and The Black Dahlia (both 2006) also crashed and burned at the box-office, Johansson should have been reaching for the smelling salts. Or her agent's throat.

Instead, she came out of the carnage smiling. Often with a bottle of perfume, or some other ladies' accoutrement, in her hand.

"You can't really take anything in this business personally," says the wise beyond her years 27-year-old. "You make the movies you want to make, and you hope they work, and you hope people like them. If they don't work, and people don't like them, you just have to move on to the next one.

"It's not like you would ever set out to make a bad movie. Well, I never have. Not knowingly . . ."

Perhaps it was a case of too much, too soon, the much-loved Lost In Translation and the sort-of-loved The Girl With The Pearl Earring making Johansson the It Girl of 2003.

By the time she got married to Ryan Reynolds in September 2008 though, Johansson wasn't so much an actress who happened to be famous as a celebrity who happened to make the odd movie. Of course, odd would be fine. It's bad movies that are the problem.

Out of her past 10 films or so, only 2008's collaboration with her would-be mentor, Woody Allen, on the sweet Vicky Cristina Barcelona, can be rated a success.

So, is it any wonder Johansson has been busy doing other things? Such as becoming a much in-demand model and singer with two albums out - 2008's Tom Waits' tribute Anywhere I Lay My Head and 2009's Break Up. The latter was released a full year before Reynolds and Johansson announced that they had separated, the former filing for divorce on December 23, 2010, citing irreconcilable differences. Johansson simultaneously filed for divorce. At least they were in agreement about something.

And when it comes to her old day job, Johansson is clearly trying to get her house in order. Which, for an actor, means hitting the stage, and proving that you can do it without the help of fast editing, trick lighting and a funky soundtrack. In 2010, the young actress got some of the best reviews of her career for her part in a revival of Arthur Miller's 1950s-set drama A View From The Bridge, which ran for 14 weeks on Broadway. For her troubles Johansson bagged herself a Tony Award.

"That's an experience that's going to stay with me," says Johansson. "It's a very different experience, playing in front of an audience, and have them believe. You can feel as though you've caught something on camera, but you never truly know until it's up there on a screen and an audience are reacting to it if it truly worked. Theatre is right there in your face.

"Took me a while to shake off that high. Once it was over, it felt like the morning after, and you just wished the night hadn't quite ended yet."

Void

Even five months running around town with Sean Penn couldn't quite fill the void. Or having nude self-portraits suddenly hit the internet. You have to admire Johansson's quick dismissal of the hacked photographs, quipping, "I know all my best angles".

Besides, Johansson has been busy throwing herself into her work again to take too much notice of a few saucy photos. Whether it's "becoming the fittest I've ever been" for next year's The Avengers, in which she once again plays her Iron Man character, The Black Widow, or finding her inner civilian for this month's We Bought A Zoo.

In Cameron Crowe's family film We Bought A Zoo, Matt Damon is the widower father of two who buys, as Johansson has put it, "a decrepit Grey Gardens of a zoo", determined to restore it to its former glory. Aiding and abetting him is Johansson's head zookeeper, a role she took seriously enough to shovel shit, feed those animals and, gulp, even go without make-up.

"It's going to be difficult for audiences to look at a familiar face and believe that she runs a zoo," says Johansson. "I wanted to get as far away from any sign of glamour as I possibly could, and that meant doing everything my character would do. And she wouldn't wear make-up. The elephants just aren't impressed by eye-liner."

We Bought A Zoo hits Irish cinemas December 23