Ashton Kutcher is world's "happiliest" married man

By Gina Keating

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The planet's "happiliest" married man, Ashton Kutcher, was once a champion carouser until he met his wife five years ago and became a changed man.

So when Kutcher set out to make his new movie "What Happens in Vegas," which opened on Friday, he drew on his rowdy bachelor days -- as well as his three-year marriage to actress Demi Moore -- to play the role of a chronic underachiever who accidentally marries the girl of his dreams.

"I never really thought I would get married," Kutcher told reporters ahead of the film's release. "I watched my parents go through a divorce and I thought, 'This is not something anybody should do.' Why put a legal document on top of a really great relationship?"

His character, Jack Fuller, may be an underachiever. But the same cannot be said of the 30-year-old Kutcher.

He rose to fame playing a high school stoner on television comedy "That '70s Show," then parlayed his TV success into a career in films such as "The Butterfly Effect" and "Bobby."

The former biochemical engineering student at University of Iowa also has produced reality television programs such as prankster show "Punk'd."

When he began dating Moore back in 2003, few Hollywood watchers believed the relationship would last because she is some 15 years his senior. But the pair were married in 2005, and by all accounts are happy.

"I knew she was the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with," he said. "I am the happiliest -- I think I just invented that word -- married guy on the planet."