Amy Adams was waiting tables at Boulder's Dinner Theatre in 1994 when a nasty patron carped, "Well, I certainly hope you're a better actress than you are a waitress."

"Oh, believe me," she responded guilelessly, "me too."

Throw in a North Carolina accent, and that kind of unfiltered, honest retort could have come straight from the mouth of Ashley, the sweet young wife Adams plays to heartbreaking effect in the tiny gem of a film called "Junebug"

If you haven't heard that the Castle Rock native was just nominated for an Oscar as best supporting actress for her performance, well then, you aren't getting your iced caramel macchiatos from Kathryn Adams at the Starbucks in Cherry Creek North.

"I've been telling everyone as they come through the line," said the proudest mom this side of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

What, you say, "Here's your change ... and by the way, my daughter was just nominated for an Academy Award"?

"Oh, I'm more subtle than that," she said with a hearty laugh. "First I ask them if they are film buffs. And if they say yes, then I tell them, 'You should see 'Junebug.' It stars my daughter, and she was just nominated for an Academy Award!"

Have a nice day!

"You should see the looks I get," she added.

It's that kind of word of mouth that has propelled "Junebug" - and Adams - onto the world's biggest stage, where on March 5 this kid who never acted in a single play at Douglas County High School will be in the heady company of Catherine Keener, Frances McDormand, Rachel Weisz and Michelle Williams.

"Completely weird, isn't it?" says Adams, 30, who has been sporting what she calls "this permanently stoned" look since hearing of her nomination. Did we mention her congratulatory phone calls have included one from Steven Spielberg?

"Junebug" is the story of a Chicago man who introduces his new wife to his North Carolina family. Adams plays a pregnant good soul who becomes enchanted with her sophisticated new sister-in-law.

It's a film that director Phil Morrison swears does not get made without Adams, whom he'd seen as the candy-striper in Spielberg's "Catch Me if You Can."

"I knew right then she'd be great as Ashley," he said. "But I admit, I forgot all about her until she walked into the audition.

"I promise this is true: If we had not found the right person to play Ashley, I would have said, 'OK, well, let's just not make the movie,"' Morrison said. "It's not that were going to pull the plug. We weren't even going to put the plug in until we found Amy."

Adams harbors "absolutely no illusion" her name will be called out on Oscar night. Asked if she sees any way in which the stars might properly align for that to happen, she gets, well, stoned-looking.

"I truly hope that whatever greater forces are at work in the universe are occupied with far more important issues than my career," said Adams, who added, "I voted for Rachel Weiss."

But Roger Ebert, distributor Sony Pictures Classics - and Amy's mom - respectfully disagree. Sure, she's the underdog. She has to be when her film grossed only $2.7 million. That's 4.4 percent of what "Brokeback," oft-hailed as "the all-time underdog movie," has grossed. "Nobody," Amy admits, "made less money than 'Junebug."'

But Adams is gathering momentum from a variety of sources. "Sony has actually spent more money promoting Amy for an Academy Award than they made at the box office," said Kathryn, "which tells you how much they believe in her."

Ebert not only named "Junebug" his fourth-best film of 2005, he wrote just days before nominations were announced, "If Amy Adams isn't nominated for an Oscar, then ... voters have not done their homework."

Apparently, they did. Adams was named best supporting actress by the National Society of Film Critics, the Broadcast Film Critics Association and others. She won a special jury prize from the Sundance Film Festival, and was named breakout performer of 2005 by the Gotham Awards, beating out Terrence Howard ("Crash," "Hustle & Flow.").

But it was Ebert who put "Junebug" on the map. All the more surprising, considering he came up to Morrison at the Cannes Film Festival and said, "Listen, I don't want to (bleep) you. I slept through your entire movie yesterday. I had food poisoning and just fell asleep."

But he swore he would make a point of seeing it. "That's absolutely true," Morrison said.

Adams was the middle of seven children by Kathryn and Rich Adams. In high school, she was an apprentice ballerina for the David Taylor Dance Company and focused on art and sculpture. Art teacher Larry Alexander said Amy "had the quiet intensity of a perfectionist," but she never considered acting, in part because, she said, "I was led to believe that I can't sing."

Her mother knew Amy was going to be a star when she was rushed into service by Boulder's Dinner Theatre for "A Chorus Line" after another actor was injured. "She learned all the songs and dances by video," Kathryn said. "When she went on stage, she hadn't had any time with the rest of the cast, and she was phenomenal."

She worked for Heritage Square Music Hall and the Country Dinner Playhouse, where producer Bill McHale said, "I felt she was something special from the very first audition." Adams calls those "the learning years" - and the poor years. She drove a rusty car the family called the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang because you could see straight through to the street from inside the car.

A producer from a Minneapolis dinner theater saw Adams in the chorus of CDP's "Anything Goes" and "stole her away," McHale said. It was there she landed the Minnesota-based "Drop Dead Gorgeous."

Seventeen films later, she still can't believe her luck.

"When I was starting out, Keri Russell had just gotten on 'Felicity,' and even though she was far more beautiful and talented, she was an inspiration to me," Adams said. "She was from Colorado, and that made me think, 'Hey, it can happen.'

"So my advice to anyone now would just be to work hard, stay focused and remember that it is just a career.

"But yeah, it can happen. It definitely can happen."

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