Huffman won best female lead at the Independent Spirit awards

Huffman's award-winning turn as pre-op transsexual Bree in Transamerica saw her nominated for the best actress Oscar, and triumph at the Golden Globes and Independent Spirit Awards.

Despite previous roles in independent films including Magnolia, Huffman believes it was thanks to her role as struggling mother Lynette Scavo in TV's Desperate Housewives that she got noticed for Transamerica.

"There are wonderful actors out there giving brilliant performances, and I'm lucky enough that, because of a television show, this movie got noticed," says Huffman.

The 43-year-old actress says she is "just really grateful" for the attention that hit series Desperate Housewives brought to the low budget film.

"I think Transamerica did something really good in its last life to get the bump of Desperate Housewives behind it."

Voice challenge

Playing a pre-operative male-to-female transsexual presented a number of challenges for the actress.

After a lot of research, she learned to perform femininity "as if it were a foreign language".

You don't want to look like Kate Moss and sound like James Earl Jones Felicity Huffman

One particular challenge was getting the character's voice right.

"Men have big chests and big heads. They resonate the sound," says Huffman.

"I don't have the chest capacity or the head capacity, nor the testosterone, to get down there.

"So it took me a long time, and many different voice teachers, to figure out how to do that."

"And then also to sound like I'm reaching for something artificial, which is a female voice, because transgender women spend a lot of time finding their female voice."

"You don't want to look like Kate Moss and sound like James Earl Jones."

Ultimately, Huffman took 45 minutes every morning to warm up her voice and body to achieve it.

Catch-22

Having achieved the voice she wanted, the actress still "felt something was missing". As a result, she went to a shop in New York to buy a prosthetic penis, which she wore throughout shooting - although it is only glimpsed in one scene.

Huffman won an Emmy for her role in Desperate Housewives in 2005

"I got one - and we dubbed him Andy. He was the full rubber package, and he lived inside my girdle.

"But I have to say that, a couple of times in Arizona when it was 120 degrees and we were in a green stationwagon and there was no air conditioning, I took Andy out once in a while."

Huffman has been asked by many people why she played the role and not a transgender actress.

Director Duncan Tucker "didn't want a man, because he wanted to honour where transgender women were going, not where they had been", says Huffman.

But when it came to transgender actresses, Tucker did not feel the actresses he came across had sufficient acting experience.

"It's a catch-22 because [transgender actresses] don't get the opportunity to act that much," explains Huffman. "And you need someone who has been on the boards for a while that Duncan could feel comfortable in trusting the part to.