Orlando's in full bloom

This could be Orlando Bloom's year. After hiding in the shadows of ensemble films such as

If he's worried, he's not showing it. When he walks into the Los Angeles hotel room - pet labrador Sidi in tow - he is an oasis of calm. Slipping off his leather jacket, he slides into a comfy chair, while Sidi obediently sits at his feet. He's well aware of the pressure that comes with Kingdom Of Heaven, in which he plays a humble blacksmith named Balian who rises to defend the city of Jerusalem from Muslim invaders. 'Of course, there's a certain amount of anticipation to see how audiences will respond and whether or not I can hold the screen for that long,' he shrugs. 'That's the challenge. I'm hoping I managed to maintain my composure throughout and I didn't drop the ball.'

He didn't. Currently reprising his role of swashbuckling Will Turner for a sequel to Pirates Of The Caribbean - the reason his skin is nut-brown and his dark hair shoulder-length --the Byronic-looking Bloom has truly blossomed. Just the right side of macho, he has a dash of Errol Flynn about him now - little wonder, then, that he's in talks to play the young 007 in an adaptation of Charlie Higson's novel, Silverfin. Bloom read the script for Kingdom Of Heaven on a plane back from Mexico, after playing the cowardly Paris in Troy. 'I was not really looking for another sword piece but it was such an amazing script,' he enthuses. 'I wanted this role so badly. He's such the polar opposite of Paris. He's a reluctant hero.'

A bit like Bloom himself. The lengthy, 130-day shoot, which reunited Bloom with Ridley Scott, who directed him in Black Hawk Down, has been a baptism of fire for Bloom - not least because throughout he was swamped by female adulation. It reached a peak when the production hit the Spanish village of Huesca. 'We couldn't sleep at night because there were girls screaming,' reports Eva Green, who plays Balian's love interest, Sybilla. 'I had never experienced quite so much attention on a daytoday level,' Bloom admits, slightly embarrassed. 'I'm used to crowds at premieres but it was a little bit unnerving facing a daily procession of people. I tried to keep my composure and just hold it together. I definitely was feeling some of that pressure. It did catch me off guard a bit.'

For the moment, Bloom only has one woman on his mind: the rising American actress Kate Bosworth, with whom he was an item for two years after they met on the set of a Gap commercial. But this January they announced they were parting company, signalling the demise of yet another fresh-faced, Hollywood golden couple.

Bloom says there has been enough 'heat', as he calls the noticeably increased paparazzi presence, to make him feel uncomfortable. 'It's unfortunate that everything has to be hung out for public display,' he grimaces. 'We're very close. We thought, just for this year, we'd give each other some time to do some growing.' So, will it be back on in 12 months? He smiles enigmatically. 'Get your crystal ball out, mate.'

As far as the future goes, he's just completed work on Cameron Crowe's forthcoming contemporary drama Elizabethtown, with Kirsten Dunst. Being temporarily marooned in Hollywood has left Bloom feeling a little homesick. Aside from friends and family, he's missing London, where he's lived since he was 16, and where he bought a flat he has yet to use. 'I long for that crazy pace of life in London that's addictive, and yet we all love to hate it.' A great pub wouldn't go amiss either. 'They're not exactly the same in LA,' he shrugs. Sounding melancholy, his voice tails off before he adds: 'But I've got a whole bunch of British DVDs, like Fawlty Towers and The Office, to keep me ticking over.'

If he's still an English lad at heart, there's enough to suggest he was aware of a wider world from an early age. Bloom's mother, Sonia, named him after the 17th-century composer Orlando Gibbons. Raising Bloom and his older sister Sam, she ran a foreign-language school in Canterbury with her partner Colin Stone, leaving her son fluent in French. For years, Bloom thought his real father was the South African political activist and lawyer Harry Bloom, his mother's former husband, who died when he was just four. But when he was 13, his mother confessed that Bloom's real dad was Stone. 'I think she was waiting for me to be old enough to understand it,' he says pragmatically. 'But when would you tell a kid about that stuff?'

A graduate of the National Youth Theatre, he moved on to the Guildhall School Of Music And Drama, during which time his career almost ended before it had begun. When he was 21, he fell three floors trying to climb a friend's drainpipe for a lark. 'I've always been "Act first think later". But this was a big wake-up call. I was almost paralysed.' It took more than a year of rehab before he was walking properly again. 'I definitely went through that "Why the f*** did that happen to me?" stuff. I was really depressed.' In the end, he says, it was the making of him. Two days before graduation from the Guildhall, he won the role of elf-archer Legolas in Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings trilogy. 'It was like winning the lottery, or as close as it gets.'

Ever since, he says, it's been 'a hold-on-fordear-life ride'. He's now seeking out new corners of the world to hide from prying eyes. 'I really miss just sitting in cafes and watching the world go by,' he reflects. He's recently come back from a holiday in Brazil. 'For the first time in a while I felt like I could sit without anyone watching me.'Admitting that lack of privacy is par for the course, he adds: 'It's hard to make mistakes when you're in the public eye.' For Bloom, as his career grows, wrestling with this dilemma will be his biggest challenge yet.

Kingdom Of Heaven opens Fri 6 May.