Danny seats on a bench on on Hollywood Boulevard, just across from where I usually go for espresso, and elephant ear. He’s probably on he’s mid sixties, and looks as if he has been around the block quite a few times. Danny smokes. The cigarettes were my means to get to know him better. I offered Danny a dollar for every cigarette he could spare, until enough trust was developed. One day Danny invited me to share a smoke and talk.
Danny reads some fifteen hours a day, nearly 400 books a year. He’s well versed on the Greek and Roman Classics, and he can carry on a brilliant dissertation on a variety of subjects ranging from current affairs to the Bill of Rights or the Afghan. Danny knows a thing or two about war. His father fought against Tito’s army in Yugoslavia, and he was born in Austria shortly before the German surrender. Ten years after the war father and son moved to the US, and eight years later Danny was being deploy as a Special Operations Officer in Laos and Cambodia where he remain for seven consecutive years behind enemy lines. Today Danny has no enemies. He sleeps in the streets adjacent to the Public Library. The Hollywood Library is Danny’s General Headquarter. The other night he allowed me to aim my camera at him, and even agreed to begin filming a series of interviews before the end of the year. The interviews will focus on his vision on democracy, liberty, and the pursue of happiness.