You probably won't be surprised to hear that Matt Damon '96 and Ben Affleck have decided to start their own production company, Pearl Street Productions. All actors want more creative control over their projects than they receive, and Matt and Ben have reached an enviable position that gives them enough Hollywood clout to make Pearl Street Productions a success.

But what is interesting is who will be sharing in their success. Matt and Ben haven't just taken the name "Pearl Street" from the carefree youth they spent with their Cantabrigian friends; they've also taken the friends. Damon and Affleck have manned their new enterprise with old childhood friends, all of them young writers, directors and producers-to-be.

How much will Damon and Affleck's names really help these budding auteurs? According to director Kevin Smith in September's issue of Boston Magazine, "friendships with Affleck and Damon are good qualifications to do great work."

Friendship with Smith is a pretty good qualification in and of itself. Long ago, in a world that had never heard of Affleck or Damon, Kevin Smith delivered the Good Will Hunting script to one of Miramax's co-presidents, permitting the chain of events that led to an Oscar for both Affleck and Damon.

Well, sure, connections are important in Hollywood, you may be thinking. There, it's all about who you know, and who you can say you're friends with. In the real world, people don't grow up with Affleck and Damon, and "connections" are reserved for the the elite whose parents have already done the hard work of making friends in high places.

Guess again.

During the second semester of my first year here at Harvard, after the trauma of blocking had long past but still elicited a twinge of discomfort, conversation between my friends and I turned to the influence Annenberg dining hall had had in our lives. Why had Harvard decided to feed all 1600-plus first-years in the same cavernous dining hall? Didn't they realize how intimidating it was to walk in and have to sit with someone you barely knew from section because you couldn't find your roommates among the mass? Sure, it was fine now, but Annenberg had been no fun in the beginning.

I remember a fellow first-year I had just met shake her head at the foolishness of my friends and my questions. "Hello? It's not like I had to leave New Jersey in order to learn what I'm learning in my classes. All you need is a textbook and a video of the lectures. The reason they brought us all to Boston is so that we can meet each other. That's what we're really getting out of being here."