Koontz Expects a Hollywood Ending : The Newport Beach master of suspense has reason to be wary of film adaptations, but he’s optimistic, especially about ‘Hideaway.’

NEWPORT BEACH —  Suspense-thriller master Dean Koontz says he’s “deliriously” happy that Jeff Goldblum has been cast to play the lead in the movie version of “Hideaway,” Koontz’s 1992 bestseller about a dead man who is surgically “reanimated,” then finds himself under the spell of an evil force.

“The minute he came on board, it raised the quality of the project: It became a more major picture,” said Koontz, 48. “Jeff Goldblum is widely regarded in the industry as an actor, not just a star.”

Koontz--who creates his string of national No. 1 bestsellers in a hilltop mansion overlooking Newport Beach--said that as soon as news leaked that Goldblum had been cast, the caliber of actors who wanted to work in the film grew considerably higher.

“There is all kinds of talk,” he said, “and there is some competition for the female lead--any one of which I’d be happy to see.”

*

Koontz won’t say who’s vying for the role of Goldblum’s wife in the film, but an even more crucial piece of casting has yet to be done: the role of Vassago, the satanic force who hides the bodies of his victims in the bowels of an abandoned amusement park east of San Juan Capistrano.

Koontz has a suggestion.

“Somebody who is very appealing but also just instantly gives you that sense of danger about them,” he said. “When I was writing it I sort of pictured a young Jack Nicholson with sunglasses on.”

Although “Hideaway’ is set primarily in Orange County, the movie will begin production late this month in Vancouver, where, Koontz says, lower production costs “can make a $16 million budget look like $20 million.”

“Hideaway” is being produced for Tri-Star by actor Dennis Quaid and his partner, Cathleen Summers. Koontz said he hasn’t read the latest draft of the screenplay. But the most recent writer attached to the project is Neal Jimenez, whose credits include “River’s Edge” and “The Waterdance” and who, Koontz said, “is considered first-rate at developing characters on screen.”

Koontz said the film’s young director, Brett Leonard, is considered “visually brilliant.” But that didn’t stop Koontz from initially being less than confident in the selection of Leonard, whose credits include “Lawnmower Man” and music videos.

“He’s got the talent to really visualize things, but there are other things required in bringing out the best performance in actors,” Koontz said. “I was a little concerned he’d turn this into a bloody sort of genre film, but I know his intention is to make an ‘A’ picture, and now I think he may do a very good job.”

When it comes to Hollywood’s treatment of his books, Koontz has reason to be leery.

Five of his nearly 60 novels have been translated to the screen. And he hasn’t been entirely pleased with the results.

Koontz said “Watchers” (1988), “Servants of Twilight” and “Whispers” (1990) were made into “dreadful” films. But he views “Demon Seed,” a 1977 film starring Julie Christie, a “decent movie.” And he was pleased with the 1990 TV movie of “The Face of Fear”--as well he should be: He wrote the screenplay and served as executive producer.

“The Face of Fear” was one of four of his novels intended to be produced by Warner Bros. for CBS television. But after producing “The Face of Fear,” plans for TV-movie versions of “Eyes of Darkness,” “Night Chills” and “Darkfall” were scrapped.

“That project became so difficult and so much of a hassle that the producer on it, Lee Rich, suggested that to push any of these forward I’d have to commit to the same level of involvement I had on ‘Face of Fear,’ which was much more intense than I initially thought it would be and I said, ‘No.’

“Working in television is a nightmare. It was just too much work for the return. During the pre-production, shooting and post production I literally was working in the neighborhood of 100 hours a week. I just couldn’t see doing that from project after project.”

Koontz has two other novels in development--”Phantoms” and “Dragon Tears”--and he recently sold his 1993 bestseller, “Mr. Murder,” to Savoy Pictures for a “seven-figure” sum.

Savoy Pictures, which produced “Shadowlands” and “A Bronx Tale,” will begin production on “Mr. Murder” next year. But most significantly for Koontz, he will serve as executive producer and have approval over the selection of writer and director.

“ ‘Mr. Murder,’ ” he said, “is going to be very much an ‘A’ picture.”

Although he has written screenplays for “The Face of Fear” and two unproduced screenplays (“Midnight” and “The Bad Place”), Koontz finds screenwriting too collaborative a process for his liking: “You have to satisfy 16 people, many of whom are executives in the studio system and not necessarily creative. Many times suggestions conflict with one another and you’re supposed to incorporate all of them.”

He also has fielded numerous offers to write original screenplays or screen adaptations. But, he said, “I just turn them down because I’d rather write an original of my own and not contract for it first.”

But to do that, he said, he has to find the time between books.

Indeed, Koontz has been hard at work on the first novel in his reported $18 to $20 million three-book deal with Alfred A. Knopf and Ballantine Books. The book, tentatively titled “Dark Rivers of the Heart,” will be out in the fall and is already being shopped around Hollywood by his agent.

Both he and his publishers consider it the best thing he’s done, and, he said, unlike in his previous novels, there is no element of the fantastic in it.

“But it’s a mark of how strange our modern world is that even a piece without fantasy is stranger than one with,” he said, adding that “the book deals with some issue that Knopf and Ballantine think will be very controversial. I think so too, and that’s going to be a new experience for me. There will be a very strong pro and con reaction to the book. I’ll be damned in some places and praised in others.”

Koontz said the last four of the nine months he spent working on the new novel “was the worst and best involvement I ever had with a book. I started at 7 in the morning and worked till 11 at night with a two-hour dinner break.”

Despite the incentive of landing lucrative deals with Hollywood for his novels, Koontz said the movies are the last thing on his mind when he sits down at his computer to write.

“First of all, you never know what they’re going to want,” he said. “The best thing is to do what you’re passionate about and that passion comes through to them and they react to it.”

Koontz acknowledges that he is a visual writer--a trait that makes his books amenable to being transferred to the screen--”but that’s just the way I am. I see things in my head when I’m working on them.

“I’ve always felt I like a reader to be immersed in a scene--to see it, taste it, smell it: to have all their senses impacted by it. In that sense sometimes people will respond to it as being cinematic, but that’s only what I think is good writing.”