The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 268

CALENDAR MOVIES ISABELLE ADJANI HOPES THAT A U.S. HIT IS IN THE CARDS By RODERICK MANN The to went day Los to before see Angeles, one she of left Isabelle her Paris to favorite Adjani fly psychics. The actress is a devotee of clairvoyants, soothsayers and the like. After she'd finished with her personal questions, she inquired about her impending visit to the United States. How would it go? Just fine, she was assured.

And so Adjani, one of the better belles of France, winged across the Atlantic light of heart. The visit did indeed go well for this blue-eyed beauty who came here to talk about her latest French film, "One Deadly Summer," which Universal is importing next month. She is hoping the -already a hit in Paris- will fare equally well here because she is anxious to blot out the memory of her one, disastrous Hollywood movie, "'The Driver," released in 1978. In that film, directed by Walter Hill, she starred with Ryan O'Neal. Most of her scenes were cut, and what was left showed no hint of the talent that in Truffaut's "'The Story of Adele already had won her the New York Film Critics and National Society of Film Critics awards.

She had mastered English expressly to do "'The Driver." Afterward she told me, "It seems I learned the language in order to have nothing to say in it." Later she was to add that "French actresses don't seem to have too much luck in Hollywood, do they? Germans, yes -look at Nastassia Kinski. And the Swedes. But not the French." Had "'The Driver" hurt her? "I think so. Afterwards the only American offers I got were bad ones. I did it, really, because after 'The Story of Adele everyone urged me to make a Hollywood film.

I turned down several, and felt I couldn't continue to do that. And I liked Walter Hill. Only later did I realize I'd made a terrible mistake." Fortunately, the film did her no harm at all in France, where it was dismissed. In 1981 she won the best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival for her work in two movies, "Possession" and "Quartet." And last year, she collected a Cesar (the French Oscar) for her work in "Possession." "I have been lucky," she said, sitting in her suite at the Beverly Wilshire, "though I confess I find it harder and harder to know what will do well." She doesn't have to concern herself with that problem for a while. When she returns to Paris in a week, she will start rehearsals immediately for Strindberg's "Miss Julie," co- French actor Niels Arestrup.

"And believe me," she said, "I'm scared. It's seven years since I was on the stage. I dare not think about it. But I know that if I don't do it now, I never will. I just hope the critics are not too harsh.

They tend to be very tough on movie actresses returning to the theater, was wildly impressed. Immediately he sought her out and offered her the role of the doomed daughter of Victor Hugo in "The Story of Adele "I wanted to do a film with her very quickly," he said, "because I hoped I could steal from her some of those precious things -the way' her face and body express everything." There was a snag. The Comedie Francaise had already offered her a 20-year -something almost unheard of. Among its restrictions was a clause stating that future film roles would have to be approved by the theater. And they didn't think much of "The Story of Adele "It was a bad time," she said.

"Without Truffaut's encouragement, I don't know what I would have done. I couldn't make up my mind. He said, 'Trust me: And he was right. But at the time I even had members of the audience coming round and calling me an idiot for going." She rejected the contract and left the theater -which not only angered the Comedie Francaise but outraged the French press. Since then she has returned only to see an occasional play.

And has never ventured backstage. "I suppose I still feel guilty about what I did," she said, "as if I'd run away from home. The fact that they offered me a 20-year contract was extraordinary. But I've had no regrets at all about what I did." Times Angeles Los FRAMPTON MARY It will be fine with Isabelle Adjani if her new film, "One Deadly Summer," due in August, blots out the memory of her one.disastrous Hollywood movie. particularly those they feel have had an said, "is that they never asked me to read easy time of it." for them or anything.

They just said, 'You'll be fine. We have faith in And there's no question -she has had It seemed their faith was justified. Soon an easy time of it. she was doing three plays a week, At 14 Isabelle Adjani, born in Paris of a sending the Paris critics into raptures German mother and Algerian-Turkish and prompting Le Figaro to remark: father, was plucked off the street by "She's clearly the phenomenon of her producer Bernard Michel, who cast her in generation." Isabelle Adjani: 'I have to learn to trust men, you see. As it is I find it hard to know why they like me.

What's the fascination? I get suspicious of them. That's why I go to a film that she made during her school holidays. This led to other work and then, at 17, to the hallowed portals of France's Comedie Francaise, where she became one of the youngest members of the acting ensemble. "What was strange about that," she ow 27, Adjani thinks she may give it all up one day. "I think so," she said.

"I feel I'm neglecting too many other aspects of my life. In many ways I envy my friend Francine Racette, who gave up her acting career to live with Donald Sutherland and bear him three children. That impresses me very much. She chose a man, a city and a way of life and never see. As it is I find it hard to know why looked back.

"I'd like to do that one day. But it's difficult. I have to learn to trust men, you 'AVANNS they like me. What's the fascination? I get suspicious of them. "That's why I go to clairvoyants.

It's always about my love life, and when I'm worried I go every week. Sometimes to several. They look at me and say, 'My £861 God, you've got and I reply, 'I know, or I wouldn't be "I don't tell the men I'm involved with that I go. Men seem to be strange about And of course you are." these things; they feel you're introducing another Did she element always take into the the advice relationship. she was CALENDAR given? "Not always.

But sometimes. There are two people in Paris who are just marvelous. They haven't been wrong about me yet." questioning: She paused, "Why? those Would limpid you blue like eyes to PAGE: have their addresses?" During her time at the theater she made another film, "La Gifle," and quietly stole it from such seasoned pros as Annie Girardot and Lino Ventura. And it was at this point that Francois Truffaut came into her life. He caught her stage performance in "Ondine" and.