Hewson's acting boot camp

NOT many people will recognise the name Eve Hewson immediately but the feisty Irish starlet is determined to strike it out on her own rather than to simply be known as the daughter of one Paul David Hewson, better known as U2's frontman, Bono.

Hence, personal questions about her famous rock star father were strictly off-limits during a telephone interview with the 23-year-old, who stars in the TV series, The Knick, currently running on cable channel, Cinemax.

Thankfully, there is still plenty to talk about as the raven-haired beauty has chalked up an impressive acting CV; having starred in over half a dozen indie films such as This Must Be The Place (2011) with Sean Penn and Enough Said (2013) with the late James Gandolfini.

The big names haven't stopped calling and her latest role finds her playing a nurse opposite Clive Owen in the Steven Soderbergh-directed period medical television drama, The Knick.

"I was overwhelmed when I got the job... I never thought I would be working with Steven this early in my career," says the New York-based actress. She also studied acting at TISCH in New York.

"(But) working with him is like being in boot camp... I've been told other directors don't work as fast as Steven does (as) he doesn't do a lot of takes and we don't really rehearse - we just go into the deep end so it was a huge experience for me," she adds.

Her role as Lucy, a young and naive nurse working in a slaughterhouse of a hospital in New York during the turn of the last century, finds her sharing many scenes with Owen - including an eyebrow-raising one in the pilot where she injects his penis with liquid cocaine.

As awkward as that might have been, Hewson praised her co-star for his professionalism and warmth. "He's so kind to everybody and a sweetheart; he's such a good actor I sometimes thought he wasn't acting - in one scene he had to vomit and I was going to get a bucket because I thought he was really going to do it," she shares.

Known for its graphic depictions of surgical procedures, The Knick can be queasy to watch. Hewson is not immune to the gore either - even though it's all prosthetics and fake blood - claiming to be "not good with blood or needles".

But she defends the show by stating that the gore was necessary so that it would disturb the viewers. But it was a different matter on the set as she had fun watching the make-up artists bring things to life and played with the sticky "blood". "You couldn't get it off you and at night, you'd go home with red hands," she says.

Hewson also found the experience of working on The Knick a unique one because the actors weren't just rattling lines from the scripts to one another. "It was fun because every day we went to work, it was to shoot a different surgery," she recalls. "And we had only one or two takes with the prosthetic so we had to get it right."

The determined actress, who initially went against her parents' wishes to enter showbiz but has since gotten their blessings, adds she's the complete opposite of weak-willed Lucy she plays and hence relishes playing the role. "There are many ways I can't relate to her but that's sort of what makes acting interesting," Hewson explains. "I can't stop myself from (speaking up) and I'm the one usually telling people what to do all the time."

All that could be handy when it comes to taking the next step in her movie career as she adds in jest, "I would like to direct something but I'm too much of a control freak - I think I might enjoy that too much!"

The Knick airs every Saturday on Cinemax at 10pm and on HBO On Demand