Cobie Smulders jumps from comedy to action

Cobie Smulders is best-known as Robin Scherbatsky, the token Canadian character on the long-running,NewYork-setTV sitcom How I Met Your Mother.

It was the first high-profile role for the White Rock, B.C., actressand she worries about the jokes poked at her origins in the series, which has a writing team of U.S. comedy veterans and one Canadian.

"The Canadian jokes get irritating, but they find it so funny how much it irritates me," she said in an interview with Jian Ghomeshi, host ofCBC's Q cultural affairs show.

"I'm curious how Canadians feel. Am I insulting my country?"

Smulders spent a year as a model when she was 17, but admits she "wasn't successful." She turned to acting in Vancouver, winning roles in Smallville and The L Word before landing her first series: the Toronto-shot Veritas.

Then came How I Met Your Mother, which Smulders admits she never expected to last seven seasons nor be such a hit.

Now,the actress is appearing in theatres in her first major movie role: the distinctly unfunny, straight-shooting S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Maria Hill in the superhero film The Avengers.

Smulders said she jumped at the change to work with the film's writer-director Joss Whedon and is excited about a role that was such a departure.

"I like to challenge myself and grow as an actress," she told Q.