What the Butler Saw (Larger Photo)

Bernar Hébert, film director and producer of Claire Obscura in Montreal, monitors the image from the movie camera above him, operated by a camerawoman whose curvy leg in jeans is on the left. (She was standing on one of the many large equipment cases they brought with them from Canada.)

The subject of their documentary, out of view in this photo, is the Californian photographer Elena Dorfman, who first visited me in 2001, when Rebecca was my only doll. The crew, which filled my home on this day with much on-the-job technical dialog in French, included a sound man out of view on the left, a gaffer (lighting electrician) out of view on the right, and another young woman sitting in the yard catching some pale sunshine on this cold spring day in England.

The documentary, which is to concentrate on Elena's photographic study of the two-way cultural crossover between life-size dolls and real women, should be ready in early 2010.

Incidentally, of the ten people who have visited me here in England to film my dolls, eight speak French as their native language. Nick Holt (Guys and Dolls) and Elena Dorfman (Still Lovers) are the two exceptions.