Born-again Donna gets serious

Kate Moss is standing in the lobby of Blakes Hotel, along with her boyfriend, Jefferson Hack, model Rosemary Ferguson and Meg Mathews. All of them are here for Meg's birthday tea - masterminded by Fran Cutler. Only a couple more faces are needed to complete the late Nineties party lineup: Sadie Frost, Jemima French (both downstairs) and, of course, Donna Air.

You may know Donna as the MTV host or the Big Breakfast presenter. Real diehard fans will have a record of her brief pop career with Crush, and her years in the BBC's children's drama, Byker Grove.

But the chances are you think of her photographed out on the town in Met Bar days, arm in arm with Natalie Appleton, the Gallagher brothers and Radio One's Sara Cox. Which is why, when she ascends the stairs a few minutes later, it's something of a surprise to find her wrapped in a cardi and not exactly reluctant to retire to the quiet of a suite. "I felt a bit out of it down there," she says in her now barely Geordie accent. "I was like 17 when I was pictured partying all the time and now I'm having some kind of earlytwenties crisis. You change so much, you can't keep up with yourself."

Donna is here to publicise her current appearance in the Vagina Monologues, her first major project since leaving the Big Breakfast in May last year, and to set the record straight about who she is now. The 22-year-old is still porcelainballerina pretty but otherwise unrecognisable as the up-for-it Geordie who used to be live on our television screens for four hours a day in the late Nineties. Donna has got serious, and her mission is to break into acting: "I did all that schmoozing and it's absolute bollocks. Get to bed early, work harder and that will see you through."

There is no mistaking her commitment, but there is something sinister about her personal cultural revolution: it's not so much that she's changed, more that she's rewriting history. The early years (raised in Newcastle, the eldest of three children, father a mechanical engineer and "motorbike hippie") are still intact, but her career is now represented as a fundraiser for her only passion: "I've been planning this for four years, working 3am to midnight, always for my Acting Fund!" On the subject of posing for men's magazines: "I tell you what, I don't know if I'd exactly like one of my children doing that." Oh, and she's really a bit of a prude: "I don't think I ever was a ladette. I'm actually a bit of a nerd. I can't even have dinner in a low-cut top without feeling selfconscious. You try to be cool, but underneath it I was too much of a goody-goody."

The object of all this spin is, of course, to shrug off the totty tag for good: "It took me five years to get a bad reputation - it's going to take me 20 to get rid of it. I'm so not a flirt, but, I guess, show me a camera and my back will straighten and I just perform, I can't help it." Even so, call me suspicious, but the rebranding of Donna has the whiff of controlling-bloke-in-the-background about it.

Her boyfriend of the last year and a half is multi-millionaire Damian Aspinall who, I'd hazard a guess, has strong views on her image. The question of her possible future sex scenes has evidently come up: "For whatever actor, no matter how cool they are, that is going to cause problems in a relationship," she says earnestly. "I say to Damian: 'Well, you'll have to come on set.'" Otherwise, the way she tells it, Aspinall is likewise practically a Trappist. She talks of him "having to spend time with his animals", a reference to Howletts, near Canterbury, the private zoo and house he inherited from his father, where they now spend most of their time. Do they have wild parties? "Oh God, no. It's Damian and I in front of the fire with tea and scones. It's him, myself and the gorillas."

Donna takes some pride in the fact that they can both number their friends on the fingers of one hand and barely see them. Tuesday to Friday they are at home in Knightsbridge where Donna busies herself with singing and acting lessons "and acupuncture, shiatsu, my trainer, yoga, reflexology, all my necessities". Damian sees his children from his first marriage, to Louise Sebag-Montefiore, every evening and then "by the time we've had our baths it's probably nine o'clock. I don't really want to spend those few hours being nice to people unless I have to".

This routine seems surprisingly middle-aged, even given that Damian is 19 years her senior. In his time he has been labelled a playboy, dating everyone from Naomi Campbell to Miss UK. He and Donna were introduced at a party by Tara Palmer-Tomkinson. Still, it appears Aspinall wants to keep her to himself: "I do believe I would have gone through this and calmed down anyway. But Damian and I are very alike and that, of course, has helped." As for the question of marriage, she sighs, exasperated that the conversation has strayed so far from her life goals, but she's a sport: "We are completely together, we live together. In our eyes we are married. I don't really feel the need for a bit of paper."

Occasionally you see a glimpse of the real Donna, rather than the born-again one. When I ask if it's true that Aspinall is covered in scars sustained on the job, she positively lights up: "Damian Aspinall peppered in scars," she trills. "I'm not going to ruin that rumour 'cos he loves to think he is." For a second there you can see what Donna could be like if she didn't have so many balls to keep in the air.