You can take the girl out of Langley, but you can't take the Langley out of the girl.

Actor Amanda Crew, starring opposite Zac Efron in the new paranormal romance Charlie St. Cloud, was a talk-show newbie when she fist-pumped her way onto the stage of the Jimmy Kimmel Show recently.

"That was my first talk show, so it was terrifying," she recalled over the phone from her Los Angeles home.

"But I had a good time, I actually gave a shout-out to Langley, maybe it'll bring us some tourists."

Back in Grade 8 at Langley's Brookswood secondary, Crew had a social-studies textbook in which an earlier student had scrawled, "I'm from Langley, wanna bang me?"

That night, she told Kimmel that was the town motto.

"It was perfect for the Jimmy Kimmel audience," she said. "Afterward I had calls from all my friends, like, are you kidding me?"

She took some of her friends with her to hang out backstage at the Kimmel appearance, to ease her nerves.

"There's a whole bar, you can hang out in this lounge area and then you have your dressing room. The movie premiere and the press has been really crazy and exciting, I wanted to share it with my friends and family."

The 24-year-old Crew has been working steadily since she was cast in the YTV series 15/Love at age 17, moving on to supporting roles in several features.

She starred in the ribald teen comedy Sex Drive in 2008, which prompted her move to Los Angeles, and she co-starred with Virginia Madsen in 2009's horror hit A Haunting in Connecticut.

But the B.C.-filmed Charlie St. Cloud marks a whole new level of attention - the love interest to mega-heartthrob Efron. He plays a grieving young man who sees the ghost of his dead younger brother, and Crew co-stars as a competitive sailor who captures his attention.

But it was Efron who was the centre of attention, even after the cameras stopped.

"I don't even know how they would find him sometimes," she said of the female fans who would wait at locations that included West Vancouver's Eagle Harbour.

"I'll never forget the first day, we were shooting out on the water, and because we were fighting the sun we didn't take a lunch break. It's so physical, we're out in the sun all day; everyone was just exhausted afterwards.

"To get back to the marina, there's like 100 girls just waiting. All I could think was, I'm so glad they're not there for me. Zac took the time to meet them; he was out there for like an hour; he took pictures with everyone, signing everything. I thought that was the coolest thing ever, because he doesn't have to do that."

The fans followed them to Deep Cove and Gibsons as well.

Crew's role required her to look like she knew how to sail on her own, which meant weeks of training beforehand.

"I had no idea it would be such a physical sport," she said. "I envisioned myself in a bikini on a yacht. It was a brutal awakening. I'm kind of klutzy - the whole shoot, I had bruises all over my body."

Off-hours meant time in the gym - stands to reason when you're on screen next to Zac Efron's abs.

"They really wanted us to physically look like we could sail these boats," said Crew. "Especially my character; she's about to sail around the world in this massive boat, so it was important that I appear that I could do that."

The feisty sailor was nothing like any other character she's played.

"She knows what she wants in life; she's not going to let anything get in the way of that. I think she's a great role model for girls. At the premiere, a lot of the girls came up to me and had that reaction. It's really cool to have that come across, that they were inspired by that."

Crew invited her parents - dad is a telecom worker and mom is a legal secretary - to L.A. for the movie's premiere, which made it easier to watch herself on screen.

"I definitely have a hard time watching myself; of course we're dissecting everything," Crew said. "But my main distraction was my dad sitting beside me crying the entire time."

Her proud father was also bawling as he snapped photos of Crew on the red carpet.

Crew is already back to auditions, her eye on the next new challenge.

Awaiting release right now is Repeaters, a dark thriller she filmed earlier this year in Mission. Crew plays a recovering addict caught in a paranormal situation.

"I don't want to take a job for the sake of taking a job," she said. "I can't work on something that I don't care about. I don't want to do something I've already done before, that I could do in my sleep."

That talk-show appearance was another one of those learning experiences.

"It's so funny. After Jimmy Kimmel, every one was like, well, are you going to go out and celebrate? Actually, I had to go home and prepare for an audition the next day. Right now my schedule is hectic, but everyday-life tasks are the same. I still have to do my laundry, drive myself around in my beat-up car."

- Glen Schaefer is with Langley Advance's sister paper The Province