`SLIDING DOORS' OPENS WORLD OF PARALLEL LIVES; UNIQUE STORY TURNS ACTOR INTO ROOKIE DIRECTOR AND SETS PALTROW UP FOR WIG-WEARING DUALISM.

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Writer

Everybody has imagined what their lives would be like if something had happened to them that didn't, or vice versa.

British actor Peter Howitt decided to do something about it. The result is his feature screenwriting and directing debut with the funny and fantastical romance ``Sliding Doors,'' which stars Gwyneth Paltrow and was produced by Oscar-winning filmmaker Sydney Pollack (``Out of Africa,'' ``Tootsie,'' ``The Firm'').

``I was just walking down the road in London one day,'' explains Howitt, who has appeared in such films as ``In the Name of the Father'' and ``Some Mother's Son.'' ``I had to make a phone call to a friend of mine, and I knew that he was going out, and I was worried whether I'd get home in time to call him. There was a phone box on the other side of the road, so I decided I should phone him there and then. I wasn't looking where I was going and nearly got mowed over by a car.

``Normally you'd go, thank goodness he didn't hit me! But something inside my head thought: What if he had hit me? What if he'd hurt himself? What are the domino effects? Then I thought, it doesn't matter whether he hit me or not, because I am not the version of me that was carrying on to phone this guy.''

The power of two

That was the germ of what, after a three-year scriptwriting process, became a tale of two Helens.

A public relations professional, Helen (Paltrow) loses her job one morning and, after taking the London subway home, catches her layabout novelist boyfriend, Gerry (John Lynch), making love to his supposedly ex-girlfriend, Lydia (Jeanne Tripplehorn).

On a parallel story track, Helen still gets sacked, but just misses the tube (the train's doors slide closed in front of her; hence the film's title). To add injury to insult, she's then mugged and, after getting a few stitches, arrives home after Lydia has left.

The movie then intricately interweaves the alternative life paths followed by the wised-up Helen and the Helen who still thinks Gerry is her faithful companion.

``It took a long time to get the two story lines to mesh right,'' Howitt admits. ``In the script, I wrote one story line in ordinary print and the other in bold italics, so that the reader would know where they are. But on the screen, you can't do one in color and one in black and white, because that's like admitting it doesn't work without a huge visual crutch to help you. So you never really know, when you start out to put it on the screen, whether it's going to work.''

Producers, understandably, were hard to convince. Indeed, it was a chance fluke that ultimately brought ``Sliding Doors'' to the screen after a British financing deal fell through.

Howitt's neighbor and actor buddy, John Hannah (``Four Weddings and a Funeral''), was making the rounds in L.A. searching for work himself. Unknown to Howitt, Hannah had brought a copy of the script along with him, and the subject came up during a meeting at Pollack's Mirage Enterprises. Intrigued, Pollack read it, and a week later ``Doors'' was a go - with Hannah cast as James, the Scottish bloke who may be Helen's salvation or just another lying creep.

``I read a lot of stuff in a given year, and most of it is so terribly derivative,'' Pollack says. ``I thought this had an original voice, and it was an honestly original idea which was both complex and deceptively simple, like all great ideas. You want to punch yourself in the head and say, why didn't anybody think of this before.''

Love at first read

When the very hot Paltrow's agents sent her a package of screenplays to consider for her next film project - the big-budget version of the '60s TV spy series ``The Avengers'' among them - they already knew that she'd have a similar response to the little English comedy.

``You don't understand what most scripts are like,'' the actress says. ``You really don't. So when you get a script that's so original and funny, with language this precise and rich, and it's so romantic ... I was just completely swept up in it. I didn't have one negative thought about it. I just thought it would be a dream to go make a little, sweet movie like this.''

A sweet, non-negative movie in which most men are scum. Considering her breakup from ex-fiance Brad Pitt last year, it's understandable that some wonder if ``Sliding Doors'' reflected Paltrow's state of mind at the time.

``A woman said to me recently, `Y'know, men all turn out to be liars like this,' '' she says with a skeptical smile. ``It's not true at all. I know far more good men than bad men.''

Personal resonance was not an issue while making ``Sliding Doors.'' Couldn't be; the tricky, double-life performance required complete concentration. Besides, there wasn't time for much else.

``We played it all back and forth,'' Paltrow explains. ``It was low-budget, so if we were in one location we had to shoot everything that happened to both Helens at that location.

``It was sort of like playing two different characters, because one side of this woman has been through something and the other one hasn't. If you experience something dramatic with anything in life, it shapes the way you perceive things and changes a lot. So they were very different energies. But y'know, the wig helped me a lot. You put it on and you're like, `OK, I'm this person.' ''

There was also the matter of keeping that impeccable English accent right. That was more second nature, though - a feat New Yorker Paltrow had previously aced in the film adaptation of Jane Austen's ``Emma.''

``This English thing I've got is just a sort of affinity for the accent and the culture,'' she says. ``I think that I understand it pretty well. I get offered tons of British girls, ever since `Emma,' and a lot of times they're much better roles than the roles that are written here.''

Keeping it straight

The capable Paltrow certainly was a key element in putting ``Doors'' across. But carefully presenting every aspect of the film was crucial.

``The single, most difficult problem we had was clarity,'' Pollack says. ``Trying to get the audience to follow the action. The first 15 minutes, it's hard. Later on, we get the hang of it and she's got the different hair. But we tried many versions to get it clear.

``We still ought to put something in the ad that says Don't Arrive Late,'' Pollack adds, apparently not joking. ``If you came in there after she caught and missed that train, you'd really be lost.''

Howitt is still amazed that his quirky film didn't get lost, but found its way to realization with the help of some of the finest film talents working today.

``I always hoped this story was interesting and thought-provoking enough to be worth telling,'' Howitt says. ``When it went into the realms that it did, well, it made me ask, what things in life can and can't you control. The whole thing was like a `Sliding Doors' moment itself.''

CAPTION(S):

4 Photos

Photo: (1--Cover--Color) What if?

Gwyneth Paltrow's life falls into place in `Sliding Doors'

(2) In ``Sliding Doors,'' Gwyneth Paltrow plays dual roles in a ``what if'' scenario about a London public-relations professional whose life could go in two decidedly different directions.

(3) Veteran producer and filmmaker Sydney Pollack, left, thought enough of the ``Sliding Doors'' script to give actor Peter Howitt his first shot at writing and directing a film.

(4) `In the script, I wrote one story line in ordinary print and the other in bold italics, so that the reader would know where they are. But on the screen, you can't do one in color and one in black and white, because that's like admitting it doesn't work without a huge visual crutch to help you.'

Peter Howitt

writer, director of ``Sliding Doors''