Elizabeth Reaser is recognized more for her role as Esme Cullen in the 'Twilight' series than any other. (AP)

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Actors live for just one role that makes them recognizable enough to get stopped on the street. Elizabeth Reaser has had several.

Sometimes, it’s Ava, the facially reconstructed accident victim on Grey’s Anatomy. But since last year, the 34-year-old actress is almost universally known as Esme Cullen, the incredibly pretty and kind vampire matriarch from the Twilight movie series.

“It’s definitely affected my life. I’ve never been involved in something like this, even with Grey’s, which has a huge fan base,” says Reaser, whose undead mother figure appears today in Twilight: New Moon, the second film in the phenomenally popular series based on Stephenie Meyer’s teen vampire books.

“This is a whole other level. When we were shooting in Vancouver, fans from all over the world would come to meet us. It was amazing. It took me a long time to realize how big it was,” she says. “It’s hard to articulate.”

In the films, Esme is the adopted mother of a group of sullenly sexy vampires stuck eternally in their teens, including Edward (Rob Pattinson), whose love for the human Bella (Kristen Stewart) plunges the whole pale, sparkly family into a world of trouble.

Reaser, a Detroit native, has appeared in several television shows, including the short-lived The Ex-List, and films such as The Family Stone, in which she played Diane Keaton and Craig T. Nelson’s daughter. But she says that it’s been harder to shake Esme after wrapping the third Twilight film, Eclipse, in October.

“It was weird leaving, because you get into the mindset of being a vampire,” she says.

Reaser admits that it took some work to adjust to Esme’s vampire tendencies. Born in 1895, the human Esme escapes an abusive marriage only to lose the son she is carrying soon after his birth. Deciding to kill herself, she narrowly survives a plunge from a cliff and is turned into a vampire by Dr. Carlisle Cullen (Peter Fascinelli).

“I had to think about the time she grew up in, what her life was like as a human,” says Reaser, who is single. “She had quite a tragic history. It was surprising I got the part, because I’m not connected to that kind of character at all. But everything about her is love, even when she’s kicking (butt), because she loves so deeply.”

What’s next after Esme Cullen? Reaser says she’d next “love to go do a play, something where I’m fat and ugly. I’d like to play someone who doesn’t want to drink blood and be pretty all the time.”