The people who made “The Death And Life Of Charlie St. Cloud” know why we’re here – and they don’t hang about giving it to us. Right from the opening credits, Zac Efron is swinging around a boat, hair artfully tousled and his tight muscles misted with something that could be sweat but is more like dew.

So Zac, I say to the current dreamboat du jour, do you, like me, ever wonder if your good looks have held back your career? It speaks well of him that he immediately laughs at this.

“It’s a big part of why I’m here, and a big part of why my fans come to my films,” he says easily. “I used to get into those conversations all the time, but now I have this ugly beard so it’s slowing down.”

The beard in question is a scruffy musketeer moustache and goatee that he slyly says “could be” for a film role, before adding: “Really I’m just testing out – how do you know what a beard will look like unless you grow one? And also to set fire to the internet!”

He may joke but, when Googled, the beard has generated hundreds of debates including a poll at UsMagazine.com, where 8,800 signed in to vote down the Efron facial topiary. People over the age of 20 without kids may be puzzled by the intense debate as to whether a nice, polite 22-year-old should stay beardless, but the girls outside his hotel spent the night on the street in the hope of seeing him (they did), and hearts were broken when he recently finally admitted – reluctantly – that “High School Musical” co-star Vanessa Hudgens is his girlfriend of three years.

Doesn’t this relentless, full-on attention drive him a bit mad? “You have to have a ninja mentality,” says Efron, who named his new production company Ninja Running. “There’s a way to sneak in and out of places. You just have to be smart about it.” A few weeks ago, he adds, he managed to enjoy a night out by shinning down the drainpipe of his hotel without the waiting paparazzi noticing.

No-one really prepared him for this kind of focus. “For me it was on-the-job training, and you just sink or swim. You learn to never take it too seriously because it’s going to be gone some day.”

Efron is so lusted after by women that comic book writer Mark Millar admits he campaigned for Efron to play the superhero geek in the movie version of Kick-Ass.

“My entire idea was that any guy would pay $10 to see someone beat the shit out of Zac Efron,” said Millar. Efron not only accepts the backhanded compliment, but is deft enough to throw in a story of his own.

“Right when ‘High School Musical’ was getting popular, one of my cousins very excitedly told me that there was a huge I Hate Zac Efron club at his school. I’m sure they’re doing great.”

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