Mark and Donnie Wahlberg to spread out Wahlburgers Restaurant

Mark Wahlberg and Donnie Wahlberg Mark and Donnie Wahlberg, in addition to their chef-brother Paul and business partner Erectile dysfunction St. Croix, are going to open a Boston hamburger joint known as Wahlburgers "soon," based on the Boston Herald. CBS orders Mark Wahlberg pilot Wahlburgers will open within the Hingham Shipyard a part of town, next door using their other group restaurant venture, the two-year-old Alma Nove. Donnie Wahlberg helps score kidney donation for lady The punny title Wahlburgers was formerly trademarked by Rochester, N.Y.-based restaurant chain Tom Wahl's, that provides an item known as the "Wahlburger." St. Croix states this surprised him and the partners, as opening a cafe or restaurant known as Wahlburgers "would be a factor we'd spoken about for quite some time.Inch Catch on present day news This group has since guaranteed a "full spectrum" utilisation of the Wahlburgers title. They're also considering opening a pizzeria in Boston next spring.

BBC to clock a second 'Hour'

BBC Two has renewed "The Hour," which airs in the U.S. on BBC America, for a second season of six episodes. The 1950s-set drama stars Romola Garai, Dominic West and Ben Whishaw and was written by series creator Abi Morgan, who exec produces with Derek Wax for Kudos Film and Television. "It has been a hugely impactful, much talked about program," BBC Two controller Janice Hadlow said, "and the potential for plot development is very exciting."A BBC America spokesperson said that although it has not been confirmed whether the cabler would air the second season of "The Hour," one could "expect to see it on the channel." BBC Two said that the second season will be set 10 months after the first season ended and will focus on the relationship between news and celebrity in '50s London. " 'The Hour recommission clearly signals BBC Two's resurgence," BBC Drama topper Ben Stephenson said, "as it marks the channel's first original British returning drama series since 'The Cops.' A second series really allows the team to build on the characters and their relationships against the exciting backdrop of their workplace." Said Kudos creative director and exec producer Jane Featherstone: " Taking us even deeper into our characters' lives and engaging the viewers with its energy, wit and story, we're chuffed to bits to be able to keep the world alive." For BBC Two, "The Hour" averaged 2.1 million viewers per episode. Other BBC Two original dramas set for 2012 include Jed Mercurio's "Line Of Duty," Stephen Poliakoff's "Dancing on the Edge," Paula Milne's "White Heat," and "Tom Stoppard's "Parade's End" (the latter headed to co-producer HBO) as well as a series of Shakespeare productions. Contact Jon Weisman at jon.weisman@variety.com

Incerti to top Venice jury

Incerti Italian director Stefano Incerti would be the new jury leader for that Venice Film Festival's Controcampo Italiano competition after director Roberta Torre's unpredicted resignation for private reasons.Incerti's "Gorbaciof," which acquired critical and public acclaim in the fest this past year, is going to be launched in France and it has been offered in areas such as the U.K., The country, Belgium, holland, Ireland and A holiday in greece.The Controcampo Italiano jury, as formerly introduced, includes film writer Aureliano Amadei, champion from the 2010 Controcampo Italiano award with "20 sigarette," and actress Cristiana Capotondi, acclaimed on her perf in Carlo Mazzacurati's "La Passione." Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com

Adventures in Journey The Final Times of Eugene Meltsner

Through Whit's new invention, the Micro-Simulator, Eugene requires a fantastic voyage through their own blood circulation system and bakes an alarming discovery. Instructed to reexamine how he'll spend the rest of the times of his existence, he takes hold motion a series of occasions which includes a bank heist, a ticking explosive device, along with a oddly familiar window washer!

U.K. teens flock to 'Inbetweeners'

"The Inbetweeners Movie"LONDON -- "The Inbetweeners Movie" is placed being among the year's greatest British hits after grossing a massive 2.58 million ($4.26 million) on its first day's previews. The pic, written by Entertainment, opened up August. 17 at 409 sites, and it is now on the right course to top $15 million through the finish from the weekend. In comparison, "The King's Speech," the very best British indie film of 2011 to date, required $5.5 million on its first weekend, as the 2010 champion "Streetdance three dimensional" required $3.six million. The $5.8 million Film4 production is really a spin-removed from Funnel 4's cult sitcom concerning the misadventures of 4 teenage boys. The BAFTA-winning TV series went for 3 seasons, and ended once they left senior high school. Within the movie, the quartet mind off for any Greek holiday to celebrate their graduation. Pic stars Simon Bird, Joe Thomas, James Buckley and Blake Harrison, and was directed by Ben Palmer from the script through the series designers Damon Beesley and Iain Morris. Producer is Chris Youthful. Entertainment Film Marketers has U.K. theatrical privileges only, with Funnel 4 possessing DVD and TV privileges. IM Global tallied up strong foreign sales at Cannes. Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com

Nora Ephron and HBOs Sheila Nevins to Receive DGA Honors

Filmmaker Nora Ephron, HBO President of Documentary Films Sheila Nevins, Senator Patrick Leahy and IATSE International President Matthew Loeb will be honored at the 2011 DGA Honors, the Directors Guild of America announced Friday. The event will take place in New York City on Thursday, October 13, 2011.our editor recommendsNora Ephron's 'The Girl Who Fixed the Umlaut' in the New Yorker'Julie & Julia' to close Rome film festival The award ceremony, which celebrates individuals who have made significant contributions to American culture through the world of film and television, will also host a special posthumous tribute to pioneering female filmmaker Alice Guy Blaché. "2011 marks the 75th anniversary of the Directors Guild of America," said DGA President Taylor Hackford. "In this anniversary year of celebrating our history and the people who have made an indelible mark on our community, DGA Honors provides a special moment to recognize a handful of people who have uniquely contributed to the betterment of our community by providing opportunity, safeguarding our livelihoods or using entertainment to open a window onto the human experience." The Special Directorial Award for Lifetime Achievement will honor filmmaker Blaché in recognition of her career as the first female filmmaker and the first filmmaker to develop narrative filmmaking. Over the span of her career, Blaché (1873-1968) directed, wrote, supervised and/or produced more than 1,000 films of all lengths and genres. Ephron, whose directing credits include This Is My Life, Sleepless in Seattle, Mixed Nuts, and Julie & Julia, has also received three Oscar nominations for screenwriting. As president of HBO Documentary Films, Nevins is responsible for overseeing the development and production of all documentaries for HBO, HBO2 and Cinemax. Nevins has supervised the production of more than 1,000 documentary programs for HBO. Senator Leahy, currently serving his seventh term, is being recognized with a DGA Honor for his commitment to safeguarding the content created by DGA members against digital theft and counterfeiting. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Leahy has been a leading voice in protecting the nation's intellectual property and in the enforcement of intellectual property rights. Loeb is the International President of IATSE (The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts), one of the largest labor unions in the entertainment and related industries with more than 110,000 members in the US and abroad. Past DGA Honors recipients have included filmmakers Robert Altman, Jonathan Demme, Milos Forman, Curtis Hanson, Spike Lee, Mike Nichols, Arthur Penn, Sydney Pollack and Martin Scorsese, as well as leaders in entertainment, labor and politics such as Creator/Producer Dick Wolf; Robert De Niro; Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels; Sopranos creator David Chase; and Congressman John Conyers, Jr. Related Topics DGA Awards Nora Ephron Julie & Julia

VIDEO: A Choir That Inspired Glee Performs on America's Got Talent

Powerhouse Choir The Powerhouse Choir from John Burroughs High School in Burbank, Calif., performed during the YouTube round of America's Got Talent auditions. Before their shaky performance of Katy Perry's "Firework," one of them talked about how this troupe inspired Glee (and indeed, the show has been shot at John Burroughs). She also noted the choir members' tendency to sing "all day, every day" and be told to shut up by their non-singing friends. Ha, that's perfect. VIDEO: America's Got a Train Wreck Otherwise, Tuesday night's episode was relatively short on the freak factor that you might expect from AGT, especially for an installment consisting of Internet submissions. The most natural example of freakishness, an 8-year-old seemingly boneless child named Breena Bell, practiced nothing but garden-variety contortions. It was weird that she was beaming and dressed like she had stepped out of Little Miss Sunshine, though. Similarly creepy were the West Springfield Dance Team, which were straight out of a vampire/Matrix hell. The judges loved them. VIDEO: America's Got Talent presents visual nonsense, names its Top 48 For our money (of which none was spent), Gabe Rocks, a skateboarding bulldog, was the most entertaining act of the night. His routine was not perfect, but that it included him lifting his leg on a cut-out of Piers Morgan made it all worth it. Morgan is like The Simpsons' Nelson rendered in human flesh - his jumping on the buzzer at the first sign of any act's shortcoming is basically his way of saying, "Ha ha!" VIDEO: America's Got Talent's triumph of the parrot spirit Watch the troupe that inspired Glee below:

The Musical 'Rent' Returns to a New New York Home

NEW YORK (AP) Adam Chanler-Berat is asked if he knows how many minutes there are in a year. He doesn't hesitate."Something like 525,600 rings true," he says with a smile.No, he's not a math whiz, just a "Rent" fan.Though he was only about 10 when Jonathan Larson's groundbreaking musical made it to Broadway in 1996, Chanler-Berat saw it at least four times and soaked up the cast album countless times. Fans like that don't forget how a year is measured in the musical's crowd-pleasing song "Seasons of Love.""For me, it was the defining rock musical of my generation," says Chanler-Berat, who grew up to become a stage actor. "It was the first show that I can remember that really spoke to me and what I felt like was my generation."This month, Chanler-Berat is fulfilling a childhood dream by joining a new off-Broadway revival of the show just three years after "Rent" tearfully closed up shop on Broadway.The new production has been entrusted to Michael Greif, who also instantly knows how many minutes are in a year: He directed the show's original off-Broadway production, helmed its Tony-winning run on Broadway and has directed most of its touring companies."I'm really happy I have the opportunity to bring it back," says Greif, who after "Rent" went on to direct "Next to Normal" and "Grey Gardens" on Broadway. "Even in the few years that it was gone, people were saying 'Oh, I wish it were back.'"Larson's tale of free-spirited artists and street people in a gritty drug- and AIDS-plagued East Village of the early 1990s was inspired by Puccini's "La Boheme" and found a ready-made audience in young people. Larson never lived to see his triumph: He died at age 35 of an aortic aneurism after its final dress rehearsal in January 1996."Rent" lasted on Broadway for 12 years and more than 5,000 performances, launching the careers of Taye Diggs, Jesse L. Martin, Idina Menzel, Adam Pascal and Anthony Rapp, who reunited for a 2005 film version."Thank God there's a new cast doing the show in New York," says Martin, who went on to star on NBC's "Law & Order" and last year in "The Merchant of Venice" on Broadway. "I think it was a bit of shame that the show closed on Broadway in the first place. I'm looking forward to see what happens."The new production, which opens Aug. 11, has found a home in one of the 499-seat theaters at New World Stages on 50th Street, a complex that has offered other former Broadway shows such as "Avenue Q" and "Million Dollar Quartet" a lifeline. The new space has given Greif a chance to "reconceive" and "reimagine" the show."I walked in and it felt like a great home for it. It felt like a great scale for it. There are plenty of things that feel very much the same in a different environment and other things that we know we have the opportunity to rethink," says Greif."I hope the heart and the soul and the wit of the show are very much the same. The show was always about an adopted family learning how to care for one another and I think that's what the show still is."Besides the new cast, there's also a new set designer in Mark Wendland who has created a labyrinth of fire escapes and metal boxes and a new choreographer in Larry Keigwin, who says he was eager to take advantage of the new theater and set."It feels like an urban jungle gym," says Keigwin, the artistic director of Keigwin & Company who has worked on the off-Broadway musical "The Wild Party" and with the Radio City Rockettes. "No one is flipping or anything, but the set allows us to be very athletic and to use a lot of space."Changes to the city in the past 15 years including gentrification of the East Village as well as medical breakthroughs that have made AIDS survivable and evolving attitudes toward gay couples have prompted Greif to treat the musical as if it were a period piece. This "Rent" will not be updated."I feel it's very important that it be firmly set in its time because New York in the late '80s and the early '90s was a very different place. HIV status meant a very different thing," he says. "The inability to imagine the future motivates so many of these characters."The new cast like the original is made up of up-and-comers, including Chanler-Berat, who plays the filmmaker Mark and was in "Next to Normal" and "Peter and the Starcatcher," and Annaleigh Ashford, who has been on Broadway in "Wicked" and "Legally Blonde." Other actors were literally babies when "Rent" first appeared on Broadway.Martin, reminiscing on his days with the show, wishes the new kids luck and isn't worried that the first cast's legacy might cast a shadow over the new team. He anticipates they'll do what he and the debut cast did dig deep to rise to the stunning material."There was supreme talent there back then in the original company and there's supreme talent in the new company. There's supreme talent in 'Rent' companies all over the world," he says. "It tends to be a bit of a star-maker."Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. By Mark Kennedy August 5, 2011 PHOTO CREDIT Joan Marcus NEW YORK (AP) Adam Chanler-Berat is asked if he knows how many minutes there are in a year. He doesn't hesitate."Something like 525,600 rings true," he says with a smile.No, he's not a math whiz, just a "Rent" fan.Though he was only about 10 when Jonathan Larson's groundbreaking musical made it to Broadway in 1996, Chanler-Berat saw it at least four times and soaked up the cast album countless times. Fans like that don't forget how a year is measured in the musical's crowd-pleasing song "Seasons of Love.""For me, it was the defining rock musical of my generation," says Chanler-Berat, who grew up to become a stage actor. "It was the first show that I can remember that really spoke to me and what I felt like was my generation."This month, Chanler-Berat is fulfilling a childhood dream by joining a new off-Broadway revival of the show just three years after "Rent" tearfully closed up shop on Broadway.The new production has been entrusted to Michael Greif, who also instantly knows how many minutes are in a year: He directed the show's original off-Broadway production, helmed its Tony-winning run on Broadway and has directed most of its touring companies."I'm really happy I have the opportunity to bring it back," says Greif, who after "Rent" went on to direct "Next to Normal" and "Grey Gardens" on Broadway. "Even in the few years that it was gone, people were saying 'Oh, I wish it were back.'"Larson's tale of free-spirited artists and street people in a gritty drug- and AIDS-plagued East Village of the early 1990s was inspired by Puccini's "La Boheme" and found a ready-made audience in young people. Larson never lived to see his triumph: He died at age 35 of an aortic aneurism after its final dress rehearsal in January 1996."Rent" lasted on Broadway for 12 years and more than 5,000 performances, launching the careers of Taye Diggs, Jesse L. Martin, Idina Menzel, Adam Pascal and Anthony Rapp, who reunited for a 2005 film version."Thank God there's a new cast doing the show in New York," says Martin, who went on to star on NBC's "Law & Order" and last year in "The Merchant of Venice" on Broadway. "I think it was a bit of shame that the show closed on Broadway in the first place. I'm looking forward to see what happens."The new production, which opens Aug. 11, has found a home in one of the 499-seat theaters at New World Stages on 50th Street, a complex that has offered other former Broadway shows such as "Avenue Q" and "Million Dollar Quartet" a lifeline. The new space has given Greif a chance to "reconceive" and "reimagine" the show."I walked in and it felt like a great home for it. It felt like a great scale for it. There are plenty of things that feel very much the same in a different environment and other things that we know we have the opportunity to rethink," says Greif."I hope the heart and the soul and the wit of the show are very much the same. The show was always about an adopted family learning how to care for one another and I think that's what the show still is."Besides the new cast, there's also a new set designer in Mark Wendland who has created a labyrinth of fire escapes and metal boxes and a new choreographer in Larry Keigwin, who says he was eager to take advantage of the new theater and set."It feels like an urban jungle gym," says Keigwin, the artistic director of Keigwin & Company who has worked on the off-Broadway musical "The Wild Party" and with the Radio City Rockettes. "No one is flipping or anything, but the set allows us to be very athletic and to use a lot of space."Changes to the city in the past 15 years including gentrification of the East Village as well as medical breakthroughs that have made AIDS survivable and evolving attitudes toward gay couples have prompted Greif to treat the musical as if it were a period piece. This "Rent" will not be updated."I feel it's very important that it be firmly set in its time because New York in the late '80s and the early '90s was a very different place. HIV status meant a very different thing," he says. "The inability to imagine the future motivates so many of these characters."The new cast like the original is made up of up-and-comers, including Chanler-Berat, who plays the filmmaker Mark and was in "Next to Normal" and "Peter and the Starcatcher," and Annaleigh Ashford, who has been on Broadway in "Wicked" and "Legally Blonde." Other actors were literally babies when "Rent" first appeared on Broadway.Martin, reminiscing on his days with the show, wishes the new kids luck and isn't worried that the first cast's legacy might cast a shadow over the new team. He anticipates they'll do what he and the debut cast did dig deep to rise to the stunning material."There was supreme talent there back then in the original company and there's supreme talent in the new company. There's supreme talent in 'Rent' companies all over the world," he says. "It tends to be a bit of a star-maker."Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Actress Annette Charles dies

Annette Charles, who performed Cha Cha DiGregorio within the 1978 film version of "Grease," died Wednesday evening in La from complications with cancer. She was 63 and received diagnosing only in recent several weeks.In "Grease" Charles' Cha Cha did an attractive dance with John Travolta's Danny Zuko in the across the country broadcast school dance contest, compelling Olivia Newton-John's Sandy to depart inside a fit of jealousy.The actress guested on a number of TV series throughout the seventies including "The Flying Nun," "Mod Squad" and "The Bionic Lady."She made an appearance in Haskell Wexler's 1985 film "Latino" as well as in a 1987 episode of "Magnum, P.I."Charles made an appearance inside a 2002 episode of VH1's "Where Could They Be Now?" series. Contact Variety Staff at news@variety.com

'NY Ink' Acquired by TLC for Second Season

Walling McGarity/TLC TLC has acquired another season of NY Ink. It'll premiere in December 2011 with 10 hour-lengthy episodes. The growing season 1 premiere attracted 1.3 total audiences. NY Ink stars Ami James, who had been first introduced within the original show within the franchise, Miami Ink, in 2005. It chronicled him opening his SoHo shop, Wooster Street Social Club. It's created by Original Media for TLC. L.A. Ink, starring Kat Von D, opened its latest season a week ago. RELATED: Kat Von D Will not Apologize for Storming Off 'Good Day L.A.' Set TLC to produce 'NY Ink' TLC Adds Brides, Babies and Transformation Shows TLC