Matt Damon may have won an Oscar for co-writing "Good Will Hunting", but his subsequent movie roles have borne little fruit at the box office. But he's back in "Ocean's Eleven" as Linus Caldwell, the baby of the group with particularly light fingers.

You are a good card player yourself, even competing at the World Series of Poker. How did you get on?

I lasted six and a half hours. I had a bad beat, because I had Kings and this guy, who is the best poker player in the world, beat me with two Aces. But it was great, because I knew I would lose eventually, it was just a good story to leave it with.

All the characters are criminals, but we still root for you. Is that because you rip off Las Vegas?

I think it's going to be satisfying for everybody. Anybody who's ever been has their Vegas story. Even if you lose 20 bucks, you go, "those guys took my money." I think the original tagline for the poster was "In any other town, they'd be the bad guys", but because it's Vegas, it's alright.

Did any of the other guys win big at the tables after-hours?

George lost 25 straight hands of blackjack. He lost 25 hands, got up, and never gambled again!

He's that bad?

I talked him into sitting down and he was like, "I won't win, I never win." I was sitting there thinking the mathematical probability of this is mind-boggling, I can't believe you haven't won yet!

Is it true you all hit the town once filming was over?

That's the good thing about an ensemble movie. We all lived in the same hotel, so we're calling each others' rooms, going out and causing trouble.