Actor Chris O'Dowd is playing through

The last time I saw Chris O'Dowd, he was centre stage at the London after-premiere party for The Sapphires, belting out soul numbers with his co-stars from the film. Pretty good he was too, though when he found out I had witnessed this revelatory performance, he consoles me with a self-deprecating "I'm sorry for that!" If nothing else, that night showed what a versatile talent this genial Irishman is.

Known to millions in Britain for his turn as slacker technician Roy in cult TV sitcom The IT Crowd, O'Dowd, 33, has made forays into the Hollywood scene in the past couple of years - from starring opposite Jack Black in the big-screen take on Gulliver's Travels to playing the kindly policeman love interest of Kristen Wiig in 2011's hit romantic comedy Bridesmaids. Nominated for an Oscar for best original screenplay, Bridesmaids took US$288 million across the globe - and proved incredible exposure for O'Dowd. "It just made a huge difference in terms of people seeing you," he says. Even Clint Eastwood came up to him in a restaurant to say how much he liked the film.

With the film produced by Judd Apatow, Hollywood's current king of comedy, O'Dowd was ushered into the inner circle. Reteaming with Wiig in Friends with Kids, he then featured in This is 40, Apatow's "sort-of-sequel" to Knocked Up. "I still feel a bit like an outsider," O'Dowd says. "I think that if there's a house that Judd Apatow built, I'm the window-cleaner looking in."

Still, with a role as a cocky entrepreneur in Lena Dunham's hip TV show Girls, not to mention that turn in The Sapphires - in which he played the boozy manager of an all-female Australian Aboriginal singing troupe - O'Dowd confesses it's been "a big couple of years" for him. He dubs it his "moving day", a golfing term used on the penultimate round of a tournament "where … it's time to show your wares" and move ahead of the pack.

At 1.9 metres tall, with a beard and curly black hair, he's not what you'd call conventionally handsome (though try telling that to his wife, author and TV presenter Dawn Porter, who met him at her 30th birthday party and instantly was smitten with his "big smiling face"). He and Porter still live in the less-than-glam Bermondsey in south London. And when they got married, their starriest guest was O'Dowd's cohort from The IT Crowd, Richard Ayoade.

Yet Hollywood seems to have fallen for his insouciant charm. His latest effort is yet another string to the bow, voicing his first big animation project. Suitably titled Epic, this 3-D offering from the creators of Ice Age is set around a magical forest defended by tiny soldiers called Leafmen. O'Dowd is Grub, an uptight snail who is part of the security detail for the queen of the forest (Beyoncé Knowles). His partner is Mub, a more laid-back slug (voiced by Parks and Recreation's Aziz Ansari).