The Specter of Success

When it comes to having Hollywood translate his best-selling suspense novels to the big screen, Dean Koontz hasn’t experienced many happy endings.

With the exception of “Demon Seed,” the 1977 futurist thriller starring Julie Christie, Koontz dismisses the eight theatrical movies based on his books as “almost universally dreadful.”

But the Newport Beach author gives a thumbs-up to the film version of “Phantoms,” his 1983 suspense novel about a Colorado ski resort where all the residents mysteriously turn up dead or missing. Authorities, seeking a biological or toxic cause, seal off the town. But the culprit proves to be far worse.

“Phantoms,” starring Peter O’Toole, Joanna Going, Rose McGowan and Ben Affleck, opens in theaters nationwide today.

“It’s the first of the theatrical films that’s a really good one. There’s nothing even close,” Koontz, 52, said in an interview at his home. “I’d rate this one nine out of 10--maybe 9 1/2 out of 10. And I’d give a four for ‘Demon Seed,’ and down to a .5 for almost everything else.”

Koontz ought to be pleased: He not only wrote the screenplay but also took an active role as executive producer.

“The contract said I’d be the writer and I’d have control of the shooting script and [serve as] executive producer in a meaningful sense,” Koontz said, adding that he and producer Joel Soisson “talked virtually daily through most of the production.”

He offered input by phone after viewing dailies on videotapes delivered to his home from the production company in Los Angeles. “It was that kind of intimate involvement. That’s the kind of situation I want to set up in the future, because it worked. We turned out a very good movie.”

Koontz’s heavy involvement in “Phantoms” reflects his growing influence on the way his novels take to the screen.

For “Intensity,” a two-night miniseries based on his 1996 thriller that aired on the Fox network last fall, he served as executive producer, chose the screenwriter and signed off on the director.

Koontz has a role in two other projects now in the works. A two-part miniseries based on his 1993 novel “Mr. Murder” will air on ABC in May, with a script by Stephen Tolkin, who also wrote the script for “Intensity.” And Mandalay Entertainment, which produced “Intensity,” is developing Koontz’s 1997 novel “Sole Survivor” as a two-night miniseries for the Fox network.

The bottom line for Koontz, who is media-blitzing not only for “Phantoms” but for his new suspense novel, “Fear Nothing” (Bantam):

“I’m only doing deals in which I have some degree of power and input, because I’m interested in production quality. . . . I’ve seen that when I’m not involved, the movies are bad; when I am involved, the movies and miniseries are good.”

Koontz has high praise for “Phantoms” director Joe Chappelle, whose only feature credit is 1994’s “Thieves Quartet,” producer Soisson and the cast.

“There was just an awful lot of talent on the project,” Koontz said, adding with a grin: “There was not one person who was a megalomaniac, and in any film project, that’s unusual.”

Although “Demon Seed” received some good reviews, none of the movies based on Koontz novels has achieved blockbuster status. He says that’s because Hollywood has mistakenly pigeonholed him as a horror writer. With “Phantoms,” the producers took a broader approach.

“It’s a contemporary setting for a science-fiction thriller that happens to be scary. There’s a big difference here. The story has logic, and horror pictures generally have no logic to them.”

Koontz somehow manages to write screenplays while also turning out a new suspense novel every year. He says he enjoys writing for the screen.

“It’s different than novels and it’s easier, quicker, in most ways,” he said. “But it’s more challenging in certain other ways, because you can’t go internal. Everything about the character has to come from action or visuals or dialogue and none of it can be what he’s thinking or feeling.”

Koontz says he now has enough clout in Hollywood that he has been offered a chance to direct his own screen adaptations.

“That might be interesting down the road,” he said, “but right now there is so much on my plate.”

No matter how well “Phantoms” or his other film projects fare, “books are my first love,” Koontz said.

Movies come a close second. A fan since he was a kid growing up in rural Pennsylvania in the late ‘40s and ‘50s, Koontz particularly enjoyed science-fiction films and “virtually all kinds of suspense--all the great noir films like ‘The Postman Always Rings Twice,’ ‘Double Indemnity,’ anything Robert Mitchum was in.”

Once his estate in Pelican Hill, just south of Corona del Mar, is completed in 1999, he and his wife, Gerda, will be able to watch movies in grand style. The 30,000-square-foot, ocean-view home will include a 2,000-square-foot, Frank Lloyd Wright / Art Deco-inspired movie theater, complete with bronze marquee, ticket booth, lounge with popcorn machine and armchair seating for 20.

Now that he’s writing more screenplays, Koontz says, he finds it beneficial to “saturate” himself with film.

“I like to look at films again and again, not for story but how each individual scene is put together,” he said. “That has more impact if you’re looking at it on a big screen.

“Also, it’s an excuse to eat Goobers or jujubes.”