It was February 2004, and Conan O’Brien was hosting his show in Toronto for the week. In the audience at the Elgin Theatre, a man was shouting; the camera panned to him. The man was wearing a jacket that lit up: It read “FLYERMAN.”

Known to Torontonians by this sobriquet was Mark Vincent Vistorino, who spent most of his life chasing the limelight.

Vistorino had become somewhat of a fixture on the Toronto concert scene as he, sometimes aggressively, handed out flyers promoting his photography business. At other times, he entertained people with his sharp remarks and occasional off-colour jokes.

So intense and unique was his persona that two Toronto filmmakers, Jason Tan and Jeff Stephenson made a documentary about Vistorino, which premiered at the 2003 Toronto International Film Festival.

Vistorino died on Nov. 15, 2016, on his way to Prague. He was 57.

The funeral will be held Tuesday at Morley Bedford Funeral Home at 159 Eglinton Ave. W.

Vistorino was born on Nov. 20, 1958. Before he took up fashion photography and became Flyerman, Vistorino worked in his family’s meat business, according to a death notice published in the Star.

Tan recalled his friendship with Vistorino, which continued long after the documentary’s completion. He described Vistorino as someone who could steal the limelight for a brief moment among the big events that were going on. Case in point: the Conan O’Brien incident.

Like quite a few other Torontonians, Tan recalled seeing Vistorino hand out flyers which promoted his photography business. He was offering to take headshots of people interesting in working as movie extras.

Tan said the flyers said something like this:

“DO YOU NEED EXTRA CASH??

“Why not become a movie extra and work in TORONTO’s bustling movie industry.”

Vistorino charged them $150 for a photo, and to give them 8 x 10s, and connect them with a casting agency for extras, Tan said.

“I don’t think you know the power of Flyerman,” Vistorino tells the camera in the documentary, also named Flyerman. “I believe that I am a superhero. People say I’m just a photographer. I’m not just anything.”

This was in the late 1980s and 1990s. He stopped handing out flyers in 1997.

“It all stopped when his father died and he became focused on managing the affairs of his father’s estate,” Tan said, adding he suspects Vistorino’s death was a heart attack.

A number of people got work through the flyers Vistorino had handed out, Tan added.

“Also, towards the end of the flyering and movie extra stuff, from 1998 onward, he became obsessed with elevating his persona of Flyerman to reach some degree of stardom,” he added. “So he made coats/costumes that lit up with the words Flyerman on the back.”

He never married and had no children, Tan said, adding that around 2006, Vistorino gave up on the dream of achieving greater stardom and became content to go to rock concerts and events where he’d talk up the event and simply feed off the excitement.

Vistorino showed that, if you speak from the heart and say what’s on your mind, and are honest in the way you express yourself, then you can pretty much say anything and it will be received by the people, Tan said.

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“He was always ready to throw his dignity under the bus to make people laugh,” he said. “And he would do that every single day. And say things off the top of his head that were just hilarious. And, even if they were off-colour, they would resonate and they would be honest and I haven’t experienced anyone like that in my life, so I think many people will share that experience.”

Vistorino who spent a large part of his life trying to find fame, also struggled with OCD, Tan said.

Tan spoke to Vistorino about five days before he left on the trip, Nov. 15, 2016. He didn’t make it to Prague and died on the flight.

“You can’t sum him up in one word,” Tan said. “He was just so unusual.”