Unlike Anne Rice, who turned Hollywood topsy-turvy attacking Tom Cruise as the lead in the film version of her “Interview With the Vampire,” author Valerie Martin likes Tri-Star’s choices for her 1990 bestseller, “Mary Reilly.” The alternative take on Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” is told from the point of view of a household maid.
“I think Julia Roberts will be fine,” says Martin in a telephone interview from Rome, where she’s been living since December. “She’s the right physical type and she’s been interested in the book for a while, which shows she’s read it.”
John Malkovich, who will play literature’s most celebrated split personality, was “one of my first choices when Tri-Star asked me who I wanted.” And Stephen Frears, who’ll direct, is perfect, she adds.
“I feel very lucky,” says Martin.
As for Rice’s outspoken criticism, Martin says, “She can afford it. I’m just glad ‘Mary Reilly’ is being made into a movie. When it comes out, people will buy the book.”
At the moment, Martin is more concerned about her latest novel, “The Great Divorce” (Doubleday, $22.50), out this week. It intertwines the lives of three women: a troubled young zookeeper, a Creole beauty abused by her husband, and Ellen Clayton, whose husband of 20 years leaves her for a younger woman — the strongest of the three stories.
“I wanted to combat the image of the marriage that breaks up and then there’s Alan Bates on the scene,” says Martin, referring to the happy ending to “An Unmarried Woman.” “In most books and movies, there’s a new man and everything is fine. I wanted a marriage that didn’t work and where the woman had to find her own way.” Martin, 45, and twice divorced, sees marriage unraveling as an institution.
“If you look at Charles and Di, it’s astounding,” she says. “Everyone knows they had grandparents and great-grandparents who hated each other and couldn’t live in the same castle. Here is this young couple which hasn’t spent much time together, and they’re turning everything upside down.
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What’s worse, there’s no other option to marriage, she says, adding, “I haven’t seen an alternative that is attractive.”