BY JIM FARBER >Staff Writer

During his career John Malkovich has played a variety of ladykillers - from the hapless Lenny in John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" to the malevolent Valmont in "Dangerous Liaisons."

The murderous tendencies of these characters, however, are child's play compared to the sinister real-life character Malkovich is portraying this weekend.

In a rare Los Angeles stage appearance, Malkovich will play Jack Unterweger, the notorious "Vienna Woods Strangler" whose dual life as a high-profile crime psychologist and secret serial killer could have been the inspiration for the CBS television series "Dexter." But what makes this performance, titled "Seduction and Despair," truly unique is its free-flowing fusion of contemporary crime and baroque music.

As conceived by Malkovich, Austrian conductor Martin Haselbock and Austrian writer Michael Sturminger, "Seduction and Despair" will combine selections by Gluck, Boccherini, Vivaldi, Haydn, Handel, Weber and Mozart inspired by that legendary ladykiller, Don Juan, with a dramatic narrative (performed by Malkovich) based on the life of Unterweger. The performance will also feature sopranos Celine Ricci and Robin Johnson, accompanied by Haselbock's period instrument ensemble, Musica Angelica.

Malkovich said he met Haselbock at a social event in Pacific Palisades. When they discussed the possibility of a collaboration, Haselbock said he was interested in performing Gluck's ballet version of "Don Juan." Malkovich suggested the story of Unterweger.

Haselbock thought Malkovich's idea made perfect musical and dramatic sense. "Many of the baroque opera subjects deal with murder, seduction, evil. The baroque and classical arias we've added fit with their text and content perfectly to the story told," he said in an e-mail exchange from his home in Austria.

The text, Haselbock continued, "does not just deal with the story of a mass killer. It reflects the position of evil in the world, the frightening fact that Unterweger was admired and loved by several highly intellectual women - some of them still convinced today of his innocence - and that 400 writers and artists did apply for his release."

Unterweger (born 1951) was convicted of strangling a Vienna prostitute in 1976. In prison he began writing short stories, poems and plays, and, after serving 14 years of a life sentence, was released on the pretext that he had been "resocialized." He then hosted an Austrian television program that discussed criminal rehabilitation - while he secretly continued his murder spree.

In 1991, Unterweger was sent by an Austrian magazine to Los Angeles to write about crime. Here, he continued his dual careers as journalist and murderer, killing three women, who were beaten, sexually assaulted with tree branches and strangled with their own brassieres.

While in L.A., Unterweger came under suspicion for the murders of the three women. Chased by police, he was arrested in Miami and sent back to Austria, where he was convicted of nine murders in 1994, including the three L.A. murders.

Unterweger committed suicide in jail the very night he was sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole.

"People like that interest us for a variety of reasons," says Malkovich. "With Unterweger there's the added thing that, unlike a John Wayne Gacy or a Ted Bundy, his case became a cause celebre, and he was really let out of prison to murder again by a sort of glitterati movement. The blood of those women is really on their hands."

Jim Farber (310) 540-5511, Ext. 416; jim.farber@dailybreeze.com

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"SEDUCTION AND DESPAIR," MUSICA ANGELICA WITH JOHN MALKOVICH

>Where: Barnum Hall Theatre, Santa Monica High School, 601 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica.

>When: 8 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday.

>Tickets: $25 to $49; $12 for students.

>Info: (310) 458-4504, www.MusicaAngelica.org.