Emma Watson - girl grows up, acts out shocker

Watson in a scene from 'This is the End'

It looks like Emma Watson is still keen to put as much space between her and Hermione Granger, the resident Harry Potter goody-goody that she played for more than a decade.

Having already appeared as a free-spirited high school student in last year’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower, for her next trick she is starring in Sofia Coppola’s much anticipated The Bling Ring, about the group of LA teenagers who were arrested in 2009 for a string of break-ins at the homes of various celebrities including Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan.

And it is dressed as her pole-dancing, thieving character, Nicki, that she appears on the cover of the new issue of GQ. Wearing a dress remarkably similar to one Julia Roberts’ Vivian would have worn on Sunset Boulevard in Pretty Woman, it’s a far cry from her cosy Hogwarts scarf.

In the accompanying interview Watson admits she is doing her best to avoid being pigeonholded. “I was open-minded about doing anything but the one thing I didn’t want to do was get myself into a corset because I was worried I would never get out again.”

She has also just popped up in the trailer for upcoming apocalyptic party film, This is the End. Playing herself, she appears swearing and wielding an axe before knocking out Seth Rogen.

While she might have been feeling slightly left behind by edgier actresses such as Kristen Stewart and Chloë Moretz, there’s only so far she’ll go to shed her good-girl image and she definitely won’t be taking on the role of Anastasia Steele. “Who here actually thinks I would do 50 Shades of Grey as a movie? Like really. For real. In real life,” she tweeted. “Good. Well that’s sorted then.”