Paul Haggis, the Director Success Didn't Spoil

So. You are Paul Haggis. You have lately bloomed. You have done so, apparently, just by damning the man and following your heart and living by those "After School Special" lessons that sound nice but rarely work in real life. And according to those who know you, you really are that "Oh, do you need help with that?" kind of nice. "Paul's never changed," says Stephen Nathan, a sometime collaborator who was best man at Haggis's wedding to his current wife, Deborah. "He realizes he's a servant of the work. . . . Any project he's in will be a quest for meaning in his life. That makes him humble."

Paul Haggis, what are you trying to pull?

He claims he avoids a massively huge head through frequent self-reminders of the precarious nature of success. Also instrumental: his wife's unabashed willingness to do an ego-block when he gets out of control.

"His family and I are all in cahoots to cut him down when necessary," says Deborah, who has now been married to Haggis for 10 years. Her husband recently bragged that three people had recognized him on a flight to Toronto. "I said, 'That's great, honey. Funny, though, no one knew you last night when I went to a screening' " at the Toronto Film Festival. Deborah's ticket was supposed to grant her VIP access but she was directed to the back of a block-long line -- the usher was not impressed with her "I'm Paul Haggis's wife" plea.

You can't help but wonder if it's all an act, a carefully constructed aw shucks mildness designed to bring Hollywood to its knees. What better way to coax A-list actors into accepting pocket-change salaries, and to get greenlighted the types of controversial films people wouldn't normally touch with a 10-mile pole?

You delicately touch on this subject with Haggis, expecting him to go wide-eyed, expecting the Canadian accent to go on overdrive. Instead, he nods gravely.

"I'm shameless when I'm trying to get something done . . . like the things that I'll tell actors during scenes. I'll tell the story of how I watched my mother die. And they go, 'Oh, oh, oh I get it now.' What a shallow [expletive] I am -- to use this moment of intense pain to motivate an actor ? I must be a deeply selfish person."

Is it bracing self-reflection? Or another layer of self-deprecating decoys?

Paul Haggis, whatever you are trying to pull, we think you pulled it off.