THOMPSON’S AGE OF DISCONTENT

“This age business really freaks me out,” said Lea Thompson. “I’m older than Lauren Bacall was when she started. She got to act with Bogart, who was twice her age, but I never get to work with anyone over 25. They say it just doesn’t look right.”

Thompson, who stars in the new John Hughes’ movie “Some Kind of Wonderful,” is herself 25. And she’s tired, she says, of always being told she looks “too young.”

“Nobody wrote youth-oriented stories for Lauren Bacall--although she was just 19 when she got started,” Thompson said. “Also Lana Turner. They weren’t considered too young to act with older men.

“But I am. When I made ‘Red Dawn’ (John Milius’ apocalyptic vision of life after a Soviet invasion of the United States), my love scene with Powers Boothe was cut out after some previews because of the age difference. And that was the main reason I took the movie--it was such a terrific scene.”

The fact that actresses like Turner, Bacall and Ava Gardner were all younger than she when they began their careers--but were not considered too young to act with mature leading men--makes Thompson wonder why attitudes have changed.

“Does it mean we’re more aware of the age differential now? You’d think it would be the other way around.”

Some older actresses, no doubt, would give a great deal to look as young as Lea Thompson, who could pass for queen of the senior prom with no trouble at all. And who, with or without mature men to act opposite, seems to keep working.

Indeed, she has the distinction already of having been in one of the most successful movies ever made--”Back to the Future”--and one of last year’s greatest flops, “Howard the Duck.”

In the first she played two roles--Michael J. Fox’s frumpish, middle-aged mother and the 17-year-old girl laying claim to his affections. In the second she played girlfriend to the duck when it arrived here from another planet.

“Who knew?” she said resignedly this week. “Any actress would have jumped at the chance of being in ‘Back to the Future.’ But so would others have said yes to the chance of being in a movie (‘Howard the Duck’) on which George Lucas was executive producer.”

Oddly enough, she said, neither movie seemed to make much difference to her career--”I didn’t get more offers after ‘Back to the Future’ and I didn’t get less after ‘Howard the Duck.’ ”

She likes “Some Kind of Wonderful” not least because she’s a fan of John Hughes, who wrote and produced it (Howard Deutch directed).

“He tells a simple story well and he’s really understanding about young women,” she said. “I think he actually likes us.

“Most men in this town write parts for women that are just window dressing. The ones that aren’t go to Meryl Streep and Kathleen Turner.”

But she’s not complaining, she hastens to add.

“I just don’t want to get stuck for years and years acting only with 25-year-olds. At this rate there’s no way I’m going to get to work with a Robert Redford. . . . “

NOT SERIOUS: Andrew McCarthy thinks it’s hilarious that the movie in which he stars, “Mannequin,” should be cleaning up at the box office.

For the chorus of groans that greeted its release--even from critics who rarely groan--could be heard all over town. No matter. People are going to see it.

“It wasn’t supposed to be taken seriously ,” he said this week. “It’s just a harmless little movie. When I was making it, I thought, ‘This is ridiculously silly,’ but I went along with it. And apparently people enjoy it.”

McCarthy, 24, who has appeared in such films as “Pretty in Pink” and “St Elmo’s Fire” and in theaters both on and off Broadway, is not one of those young actors who takes himself too seriously. Indeed, when one critic seemed to be taking him seriously last year, McCarthy said mildly, “We’re not talking apartheid here. We’re talking about a guy who makes movies.”

He has a brief role in the upcoming movie (March 20) “Waiting for the Moon,” about the lives of Gertrude Stein and her longtime companion, Alice B. Toklas.

He plays a young American on his way to fight in the Spanish Civil War who is picked up by the two women.

“It’s just a small part,” he said, “a few scenes. But I enjoyed doing it. No money, of course, and my dressing room was a Volkswagen, but it was fun.”

Directed by Jill Godmilow, the film stars Linda Hunt as Alice B. Toklas and Linda Bassett as Stein.

McCarthy hopes to continue alternating between theater and films--”It’s better than sitting around waiting for the telephone to ring.”

He also hopes to find a casino nearby whenever he’s working. When he was making “Mannequin” in Philadelphia, he made several trips to nearby Atlantic City to play blackjack. He loves gambling.

“With a per diem (daily expenses) and some time on my hands,” he said, “the temptation was just too great.”

QUOTE: From Anthony Hopkins: “Most actors are damaged goods, you know.”