coltishness

Her grins betray pride in her work and in her own fiendishness, blending her callous coltishness with a midcareer self-assurance.

You could say they make for an exemplary cast of understudies. Acker too often works her mouth into a pained smile-frown, but she radiates some of the lovely gawky coltishness of the young Audrey Hepburn.

While Tyler's talents as an actress may still be developing--or debatable, depending on your point of view--it is her presence, her matter-of-fact ease with her sensuality, her odd combination of coltishness and placidity that have turned her into an art-house goddess, an American answer to European actresses like Emmanuelle Beart and Julie Delpy.

The grand thing is to get rid of dogged sulks and coltishness; of that wayward, swerving, hesitating gait, which says, “here’s my foot, and there’s my foot;” or, “there is a lion in the street, I cannot go forth.”

The whole body stood a thought too high for its breadth, with a hint of coltishness in the thin arms and thick elbow-joints.