At 46 years old, Laura Linney is as red-hot as the body-hugging dress she wears on the September cover of More magazine.

Besides being crazy in love with husband of one year Marc Schauer ("Marc has been a gift," the actress gushes), she continues to make critically acclaimed movies and now has her very own Showtime series, "The Big C."

And all that good fortune has given Linney a special glow. "I feel like I'm getting better looking as I get older," she tells More. "It's true."

On "The Big C," which premieres Aug. 16, Linney plays a wife and mother battling stage 4 melanoma and dealing with matters of life and death.

They're topics Linney has been thinking a lot about lately, particularly her life with second husband Schauer and the loss of her good friend Natasha Richardson.

Linney met Schauer, a real-estate broker, at the 2004 Telluride Film Festival, where he was assigned as her VIP host.

"I remember turning and looking at him -- Oh my God, am I attracted to my handler?" she recalls. "But there was a part of me that was very relieved. I felt like something was waking up. I thought, How wonderful that I can feel this again."

When the two decided to exchange vows in May 2009, Linney almost postponed the nuptials because Richardson, who had died in a skiing accident two months earlier, couldn't be there.

"She was so happy when we got engaged and she kept saying: 'When is this wedding happening?' We were on the phone a lot about the plans." says Linney.

"Those of us who knew and loved her and benefited from her incredible talent, we'll never be the same."

Ultimately, the couple held an intimate ceremony in Linney's Connecticut backyard, with Richardson's husband, Liam Neeson, walking her down the aisle.

Still, says Linney, "I have a lot of friends who've died way too young. And I'm a little angry about it. It makes me very upset at the whole viewpoint that there's something wrong with aging when it is a privilege to grow old."

Indeed, Linney tells More she likes what she sees in the mirror as time goes by. "I'm sort of trying to be friends with it and say, Look, there's a little bit of my grandmother there."

In fact, the actress says that she and BFF/"Big Love" star Jeanne Tripplehorn have made a pact never to get nipped or tucked. "We're not going under the knife, we're not going to do Botox. We're both very committed to approaching life gracefully."

That includes getting naked on camera whenever it's called for. "I'm a real tart," jokes Linney. "I've been naked in a lot of movies. [If] I feel that nudity in some way will add to the story or the understanding of the character, I'll do it."

The new issue of More hits newsstands Aug. 24.

In related news, read Julia Roberts's take on aging gracefully.