Hollywood beauty Drew Barrymore may be 31 with several movies under her belt but she is still so strongly identified as ET’s little friend Gertie, not quite a grown woman.

Curtis Hanson, the writer/director of LA Confidential, insists that he and she are about to change that with the second of her two new films, Lucky You.

“I really wanted to give her the opportunity to play what would be perceived as a more womanly character than she has played before,” he was quoted by the Independent, as saying.

Yet Barrymore seems unperturbed about the industry’s perception of her. “I do want to avoid being repetitive and I know I have been. I love romantic comedies. I love happy endings. But I know now that it is time to get in touch with a different side of myself – the one that is mature, adult and dramatic. I do want to be a ‘woman’ woman rather than a young woman.”

Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore are attending the premiere of their new movie Music and Lyrics tonight in London, England.