Hollywood Exclusive by Marilyn Beck & Stacy Jenel Smith

Look for Jim Belushi to turn producer/director/movie star — as soon as his strike-crippled industry is allowed to return to work.

He wrapped shooting of his "According to Jim" sitcom Friday night (Jan. 11), grinding out new episodes of the show that were penned before the writers' strike. "We were lucky with that," he says.

They were less lucky with "The Catch," the Lion's Gate picture in which

Jim is to star as a 45-year-old who returns to junior college as a football star. He loves the storyline — based, he says, on a true story of a middle-ager in Fullerton, Calif. But, he says, "It needs rewriting. We won't shoot until it's ready. I'm directing and producing, and it's got to be right."

Right now, he's filling his free time with concert gigs, has just completed a Blues Brothers performance with Dan Aykroyd for AT&T, and will be performing at an upcoming Frank Sinatra charity event in Palm Springs.

Why the nonstop work? "It's all about the passion and the joy," he says. He notes that a 90-minute show is more exhausting than working an eight-hour day on his series. "But the work is so freeing, it's just remarkable."

THE VIDEOLAND VIEW: Emmy-winning actor Michael Emerson still maintains a hero lies within the ruthless, antagonistic Ben Linus (leader of "the Others") he plays on "Lost," which is returning for its fourth season Jan. 31. The troupe was only able to shoot eight episodes before the writers' strike, but Emerson says after shooting those segments, he's more convinced than ever that the end Ben is working toward justifies his ruthless means.

"I feel it even more strongly that Ben is in a position to save life on this planet," says Emerson. "It's a show about parables. People say to me they were disappointed when they realized the island wasn't purgatory, and I'm here to say it is a place where people can process pasts and are tested, so in a very real way, it's still a purgatory story as a parable or metaphor."

Emerson says the writers' strike has left him feeling "we're in our own show biz purgatory — reflecting on the sins of our past, wondering if we'll ever come up into the light. I'm just hanging out in New York wondering what the next move will be. It would be so nice to finish this season. The promise of the first half is really strong. It's like a derailed train. Everybody's in high gear to do the work and unable to do anything else." Even if the strike were over in time to salvage the second half of the season, he notes the troupe would have to "come back from scratch.

The crew's all gone. The only people still connected to the show are the cast, and even that will wear away if the strike goes on too long. They either pay you or cut you loose."

A PART TO DIE FOR: Professional skateboarder Rob Dyrdek and his best friend/bodyguard, Christopher "Big Black" Boykin, have a whole new world of opportunities thanks to their hit MTV reality show, "Rob and Big," which just returned for its third season. One such project is a part in the Robert De Niro/Al Pacino flick "Righteous Kill," due out in April.

"I get shot in the head by Al Pacino. It doesn't get any better than that. I got to lay dead for three hours while Al Pacino and Robert De Niro talked about my dead body. I felt like I was living in a dream," gushes Rob, who says that although he enjoyed the experience, he has no plans to focus on acting. "Ultimately, the things I want to do with skateboarding are more important to me and what I am focused on long term."

Rob certainly has his hands full with the MTV show and skateboarding. "I did a big deal with Monster where they're going to buy a city block in downtown L.A. and I'm going to build a private urban plaza for skateboarding. I started a new foundation called Safe Spot/Skate Spot that builds skate spots on unused land. I also opened a store in Venice Beach that I own with Travis Barker. There's a lot going on."

Funny sidekick Chris Boykin, who's putting out his own shoe and clothing line, says he believes this is just the beginning of what people will see of his pal. "Rob is more than just a skateboarder. He's a very comedic man with a personality. A lot of skaters don't have that. I think that's why people really enjoy the show."

TRADING PLACES: Maria Canals Barrera, who plays the mother of three teenage wizards on the Disney Channel's "Wizards of Waverly Place," says they're going to be doing a take-off of the 2003 Jamie Lee Curtis/Lindsay Lohan comedy "Freaky Friday" in an upcoming episode. "My daughter is turning 15, and we want to give her a Quinceanera (a girl's traditional Hispanic coming-of-age birthday celebration), but she doesn't want to do it because it's old-fashioned. When she finds out that the reason I wanted to give her one so badly is because I didn't get to have one, she does a spell, and I get to be in her body and she's in my body. This is a great part for me because the parents have so much to do with the storylines. It's a real family ensemble."

To find out more about Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith and read their past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2008 MARILYN BECK AND STACY JENEL SMITH

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