Recently developed single-root multireference Brillouin-Wi,oner coupled-cluster (MR BWCC) theory, which deals with one state at a time while employing a multiconfigurational reference wave function, is applied to the ground state of the Fr! molecule using a two-determinant reference space at the level of the CCSD approximation. The method represents a brand-new coupled-cluster (CC) approach to quasidegenerate problems which combines merits of two theories: the single-reference CC method in a nondegenerate case and the Hilbert space MR CC method in quasidegenerate case. The method is able to switch itself from a nondegenerate to a fully degenerate case in a continuous manner, providing thus smooth potential energy surfaces. Moreover, in contrast to the Hilbert space MR CC approaches, it does not contain the so-called coupling terms and completely reduces to the standard single-reference CC method in a highly nondegenerate region. Using a [4s, 3p, 1d] and [4s, 3p, 2d, 1f] basis sets, the calculated potential energy curves are smooth, dissociate correctly and the results are compared with other available multireference techniques as well as experiment. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics.