Michael Therriault is cute. For the five-foot-seven-inch dimple-faced 32-year-old actor, that’s been both a blessing and a curse. Cute helped him land the role of Leo Bloom, the schlemiel accountant, in the 2003 Toronto staging of The Producers. Cute made New York critics coo over his sprightly performance as Motel the Tailor in last year’s Broadway revival of Fiddler on the Roof. And in a 1999 Stratford production of The Tempest, he was cast, of course, as Ariel, the delicate faerie. But looks deceive, and inside Therriault is one determined cuss—at age 12, he decided he wanted to attend a high school like the one he’d seen on the TV show Fame. When his parents told him he couldn’t, the Oakville native auditioned for the Etobicoke School for the Arts anyway and secured a place, presenting the package to his folks as a fait accompli. Twenty-one years later, with dozens of acting, dancing and singing credits to his name, he tackles a role that doesn’t exactly inspire cheek pinching, playing the psychotic, hunchbacked Gollum in the $27-million stage production of The Lord of the Rings. “I hardly ever get cast in evil or weird roles,” he says, “and that’s why I’m going to revel in Gollum.” The imp within has evidently won this round of its ongoing struggle with the outward angel.

Michael Therriault stars in The Lord of the Rings, kicking off Feb. 2.