Barbie star Michael Cera says success is 'dumb luck'

Barbie star Michael Cera says success is 'dumb luck'
Michael Cera says his acting success just comes down to "dumb luck". -AP

Michael Cera thinks "dumb luck" is the reason for his success.

The 36-year-old actor started his career as child and dabbled in various teen programmes before finding mainstream success with the sitcom Arrested Development but has always made sure to "live on very little" so he can keep his passion alive with the projects he chooses.

Asked how he found success, he told PageSix: "Dumb luck. I've always kind of lived (on) very little means in a way because I really like having freedom to say no to things. It's how to stay in love with what you're doing."

The Barbie star enjoys having time to himself in between acting jobs, but is then always eager to get back to work as he noted that as a freelancer it is always impossible to know where the next paycheck is coming from.

He said: "I kind of like time in between jobs, then I get kind of itchy. As an actor, you're like a freelance person and you never know what the next thing is, so you kind of have to make peace with that feeling of the unknown."

Most recently, Cera can be seen in the Wes Anderson movie The Phoenician Scheme and noted that it "definitely felt goofy" to put on the Swedish accent that was required for the role of entomologist Bjorn Lund. 

He added: "(I was) calibrating it in a way that it didn't tip into being distracting or damaging the overall balance and the effect of the movie."

"Working with Anderson was surreal, but it also just feels normal…Everybody's happy to be there. And you really feel that. Everybody knows that it's an unusual opportunity to work on a movie like this with someone like Wes and with a team like that.

"So, there's a really happy spirit in the air."