By Liz Clarke
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, May 31, 2005; D04

PARIS, May 30 -- The gathering was billed as an informal chat with Victor Hanescu, the biggest surprise of the French Open's men's draw, who has quietly played his way into Tuesday's quarterfinals against the world's No. 1 player, Roger Federer. And to pique media interest in the unseeded Romanian, tournament organizers also rounded up his more famous countrymen -- Ilie Nastase, the audaciously gifted and ill-mannered 1973 French Open champion (also known as the most fined player in the history of the game), and Nastase's former doubles partner, mentor and Svengali, Ion Tiriac.

As the honoree, the lanky Hanescu (6 feet 6, 187 pounds) started things off. Yes, he said, he was very happy to be here. And yes, he confessed, he was a little surprised to find himself, at age 23 and a tennis player almost by accident, among the final eight players in the French Open.

And that's about as far as it got before Nastase and Tiriac took over.

"I want to get him more excited, like me !" Nastase blurted out, grabbing the taciturn Hanescu by the shoulders and shaking him like a rag doll. "I touch him a little bit! Maybe he gets excited!"

Declared Tiriac, "He's one of the quietest players I ever met in my life!"

"After Borg !" Nastase bellowed back. "He is second ! After [Bjorn] Borg !"

Hanescu's head just swiveled back and forth at the exchange. So did the heads of the assembled reporters, who could barely get a word in. A Swiss journalist made a stab. "Mr. Nastase," he began, "I was a little bit too young to see all of your matches, but . . . "

"Your father was too young to see his matches!" Tiriac roared. "Where do you think he has the hair from? The operation to put his hair up, up, up! That's what he has! There are wrinkles in the wrinkles! Look at him!"

"I'll always be seven years younger than him! Always!" the graying Nastase hissed back, cutting his eyes at the journalists' notepads. "Please, can you put that down? I'm 59! He's 66!"

Somehow, in between the verbal volleys that zinged past, Hanescu managed to eke out bits of his life story. As a child he was tall for his age, so his parents sent him to a local Bucharest park to play basketball. But the coaches told him he was too young. Walking home, he passed an empty tennis court, so that is the sport he took up.

Hanescu explained that he has always been quiet. He does not curse. And only once, at age 14, he broke a racket.

"I cannot be like other players like that," Hanescu said. "I'm happy like this."

Asked if he had tennis idols as a child, Hanescu responded: "Of course, Mr. Nastase was. Anyway, I was young. But I heard a lot of stories about him. I was dreaming to be like him."

" That is the disaster of the young Romanian generation!" Tiriac intoned. "Because Nastase is their idol!"