He dropped the kids off at school, auditioned for a star movie role, jetted interstate, brewed a beer and rode a motorcycle.
     And all before noon. For Paul Mercurio, the softshoe shuffler who became a superstar in the hit movie Strictly Ballroom, it was strictly normal.
     The 32-year-old dancer, who has now made five films, would rather have been at home entertaining daughters Elise, 5, and Emily, 3.
     Strictly Ballroom turned the talented young Sydney dancer into a movie star. That was three years ago.
     And, the fact is, Mercurio doesn't have any time for all that glitz and hype, anyway.
     ``No, I don't see myself as a star,'' Mercurio said in Adelaide yesterday. ``That's the talk of the salesmen. ``There are times when I get a buzz out of it. But when people stop me in the supermarket and ask for my autograph, I sometimes wonder what it's all about.''
     Mercurio describes himself as ``just a married guy with kids''. ``I like sitting at home, playing with the kids and brewing beer,'' he says.
     Mercurio's baggage included samples of his latest brew. He has asked Adelaide's Coopers Brewery Ltd to produce a special beer for him, under his own label, and spent yesterday afternoon trying to win over the Coopers technical people.
     ``It's a very special brew, a spicy red ale,'' says Mercurio, who in the past 12 months has completed three movies.
     He played the lead role, alongside Ben Kingsley, in The Bible: Joseph, which this week took an Emmy Award; starred as a bikie in the Australian movie Back of Beyond; and earlier this year took the lead role in Red Ribbon Blues, a Hollywood production.
     Mercurio hasn't danced for two years and admits: ``I have missed it. After all, I started dancing when I was nine.
     ``The film seems to have taken over.
     ``But it has been terrific.
     ``I can't dance forever. I'm getting longer and longer in the tooth. ``I made a conscious effort after Strictly Ballroom not to be pigeon-holed into dancing.
     ``I want to make a career out of acting long-term. I would like to think that I would do movies for the same reason I dance - because I enjoy it.''
     There are ``a couple of scripts on the table'', but Mercurio isn't giving anything away.
     ``One thing I have learnt is to say no,'' he says. There are things he won't do.
     But they don't include men's underwear ads and riding high-powered motorcycles.
     He owns a powerful road bike and rides it every day ``My wife Andrea uses the car.''