Kelly Macdonald is as polite, unassuming, down to earth and resolutely Scottish as you would hope. When she mentions that she’s "actually staring at the Statue of Liberty through my window" while we speak on the phone, she sounds as bemused as anybody.

But she really shouldn’t be. After a decade of increasingly high-profile work under the aegis of such luminaries as Robert Altman (Gosford Park), Coen Brothers (No Country For Old Men) and Robert Winterbottom (Cock And Bull Story), McDonald is very much in demand on both sides of the Atlantic - including in the Big Apple, where she's currently filming Boardwalk Empire, one of the recent wave of big-budget TV series proving that quality drama need not be restricted to the big screen,

She's here to talk about her film, The Decoy Bride, a rom-com set in her native Scotland, with the plot of a Hollywood actress coming to the Highlands to get married. When the press descend on the tiny village, a down-to-earth local girl is recruited to put them off the scent. After years of working in America, which one of these is most resonant to McDonald?

"Definitely the 'neeps and 'tatties one, through and through," she chortles. "I loved filming there. I always come back. And I'm nothing like as glamorous as (co-star) Alice Eve. It was great to do some comedy though, even though what I'm normally associated with are darker, more brooding roles."

Decoy Bride was actually made the year before last, before McDonald headed to the States for Boardwalk Empire (pausing only to move home to Glasgow - the apple is not going to fall far, it seems) and the safe hands of exec producer Martin Scorsese:

"He's absolutely as you would hope, a fascinating man, and I'm so pleased that I'm in his orbit," she reveals.

"At the beginning it was just another job, and I wanted to be part of the pilot, but now it's just going on and on. It's not something that I planned for, but I'm really enjoying watching my character develop. And I'm getting to do more work, which is the brilliant part."

Coming next for McDonald is Anna Karenina with Keira Knightley - she really doesn't seem to have stopped since we first saw her in Trainspotting back in 1996. Was this always the plan?

"No plan," she laughs at the very thought. "I was always fascinated, reading interviews with actors and actresses, I kind of wondered what it would be like... but I didn't think for one minute it would happen."

Despite her undoubted abilities and recognition, does she ever feel inadequate to the task or the attention? She chuckles: "I try not to, but I am Scottish."

The Decoy Bride is in UK cinemas from Friday 9 March with Kelly Macdonald, Alice Eve and David Tennant, and on DVD from 12 March. Here's a trailer below - and an exclusive clip above: