Francois et Daniel

"Is that you?", a new acquaintance once asked, walking into my office for the first time and noticing the large photo on the poster that has hung over my computer, at work stations here and there, for close to some twenty years. "No. That's not Dan," he realized.

The mistake was flattering. It reminded me of the only other time in my life something comparable had occurred: walking out of the Yankees' spring training facility one year, in my official Yankee jacket and carrying a bag from which a bat protruded (I had caught the game on my way to the airport from a Florida baseball camp.) A near-sighted old lady, who had attended the Yank's drubbing of the A's, came up to me and said, "You played very well this afternoon."

I've been out of the hero thing for a long time now - I've grown comfortable enough in my own skin to not want to wear anybody else's - but if there's a man I still identify with it's him, the one who's softly smiling face looks down over me every day as I type, as if the God of Creativity to whom I bow, Mecca-style.

I often reflect on the irony of Citizen Kane being one of his favorite films (well, okay; whose list isn'tit on?), and that scene in one of his best films where a childhood version of himself cleverly engineers a theft of its lobby cards from a movie house. In much the same manner, I have had to steal images of Francois Truffaut, albeit mine are anecdotal.

Like the shadowy reporter in Kane, I have made it a habit to seek out anyone who has known him. The count, so far, stands at three: a bohemian, a bookstore owner, and an actress.

The bohemian, a tall, sophisticated brunette who might list her occupation as hobnobber, had the most limited encounter: she spied him across from her table in a Paris restaurant, eating with one of his daughters.

More substantial is the tale collected from the bookstore owner, the sober-faced keeper of an LA. Memorabilia shop Truffaut liked to visit when in Hollywood. I eagerly asked him, "Did you meet Truffaut when he used to come in here?" "Yes - at the old store." "And what was he like?" "He could be accommodating but mostly he was very focused."

The actress. She shall remain nameless, even though she recently spilled the beans on her affair with the man in the audio version of her autobiography. I didn't know that at the time - she was appearing in a film I had written - but did get one small insight from her: "The film I was working on with him, they had this extremely expensive champagne for the stars, and this much cheaper stuff for the crew. Francois was the only one to take note of this. He said, 'Non, non, non!' He made sure that everybody had the same champagne."

It's a crudely drawn character sketch I've managed to put together, showing an attentive parent, a polite but preoccupied public figure, and a vocal champion of the underdog; in short, a small affirmation of many of the qualities reflected in such films as Small Change, Day For Night, and The 400 Blows. .

Like a dedicated pointillist, I'm still amassing dots - I've made a note to hook back up with a reporter acquaintance who I think once interviewed him - and hope to some day have bunched enough of them together to constitute a grand representation, one that reveals the man's Rosebud, the essence to which we can attribute his creativity.

I know mine: the squinty eyes, sly smile and Napoleonic nose that look over me as I type.