By BRUCE KIRKLAND --

HOLLYWOOD - In the new movie Don Juan DeMarco, one of the sweetest, funniest, sassiest scenes not involving Johnny Depp has Marlon Brando and Faye Dunaway frolicking in bed.

They're playing a married couple renewing their love in this effervescent flick about romantic delusions. Brando shoots popcorn into the air, Dunaway squirms about in bed to catch each blast in her mouth, and they tally up her successful scores with lipstick slashes on her left arm. It's zany and it's sexy. They keep their clothes on. Brando is 71 and Dunaway is 54.

"The popcorn scene was his idea," Dunaway says in awe of her legendary co-star, who plays the delusional Depp's psychiatrist. "It's wonderful, it's unique, that's Marlon."

Dunaway, once an Oscar winner for her powerful control freak turn in Network, once a superstar for her stellar work in films such as Bonnie & Clyde and Chinatown, once ridiculed for her psychotic melodrama in Mommie Dearest, is now underused and undernourished creatively. Her role in Don Juan is decidedly small, if memorable at times. But Dunaway seems to be taking it in stride.

"It's a nice role," she says of her work in Don Juan. "And it's opposite Brando, so I really wanted to play it."

By the same token, Dunaway recently stormed through Toronto to play a supporting role as a Polish countess in the Canadian television series Road To Avonlea. The message is clear: Don't write her off, don't take her for granted.

"You know what's interesting? You can't ever count anybody out in this business! The conventional wisdom will be spouted at you forever and then somebody like Jane Fonda will come along and play a rash of roles. It's crazy, but the fulcrum of the industry is personal passion."

Passion she has, even if it's not being expressed in her own romantic life. Unlike her nurturing wife in Don Juan DeMarco, Dunaway, twice married and twice divorced, is single and not seeing any men. She calls herself both a romantic and a realist.

The romantic in her - the Don Juan movie gets people talking about their personal love lives like a magic potion - says she would like to be married thrice. "Yeah, I do. I said recently I would give it all up for that, for walking on the beach and sharing the moments. I'm not sure that it's true but I would like to think it would become very important in my life."

The realist in her says that, at 54 and still as feisty as ever, she is not willing yet to make the concessions that would lead to marriage, even if she did have a man in mind in the future.

"Who knows? It's the hardest thing I know, to connect with another person. I'm very independent. I want to do things my way. I have to learn to let that go as much as I can.

"It's hard to find someone you can connect with in that way. One meets a lot of people but it is no good unless it's a meeting of the hearts. "Maybe I haven't been ready, yet. I'm looking for it, but not quite yet. I don't have answers for it."

What she does have is an answer for her continuing career, even if she is relegated to character roles. Dunaway stays in excellent physical shape with workouts and a strict, healthy diet.

"A lot of actresses my age are fat," she says bluntly. "I could be. Somehow, I've found a way of living that involves (keeping fit) because I want to look good in front of a camera. That's part of my job."


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