It’s rare that Eliza Dushku gets to be, well, Eliza Dushku.

But on this particular Thursday afternoon, dressed in a pair of yoga pants, eating Trader Joe’s chili out of the can and hanging out at home with her two dogs, she’s at her most comfortable.

“Look,” she says, holding her cellphone in an outstretched hand, “my nephew was born today! So cute? They usually don’t look that cute when they’re a few hours old, right?”

The actress perches in front of her laptop to finish buying a plane ticket to Boston so she can visit the newest member of her clan. She was able to dip into her hometown the next week to coo with the new baby after making talk-show rounds to chat up her latest project, Dollhouse.

“I wanted to be a political science professor and go to school in Boston. I never wanted to be a big, famous movie star and TV star. It kind of found me. I was at a point where I could have packed it all up and gone back to Boston, and I would have been fine and happy. And a little richer, both financially and having had the experiences that I’ve had since I was 10 working with people like De Niro and Schwarzenegger.

“But I thought if I was going to get out of this business, I wanted to end on a strong note. I wanted to do something that I put my heart and my hard work into full force. And this is that.”

Find out what Eliza had to say about the show and read more about her life adventures in the full interview with USA Today.

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