It's a family affair on the set of Kyra Sedgwick's "The Closer" these days — with the actress's 17-year-old daughter, Sosie, on board for a four-episode arc of the TNT series, beginning tonight (8/3) — and husband Kevin Bacon directing his fourth episode of the popular show. We caught up with Kevin as he was driving to work the other day, and he told us Sosie "is actually here with me now. She gets the chance to work with her favorite director today. I've got both my girls in front of the camera there. She's doing a brilliant job." Sosie is playing the niece of Kyra's police interrogator extraordinaire, Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson.

Both Kyra and Kevin are up for Emmy honors this year; she for the series, and he for his deeply moving HBO movie "Taking Chance" — recreating the real-life saga of a Marine Corps. lieutenant colonel who escorted home the body of a fallen 19-year-old private. It wasn't only critics who praised it. "If this doesn't get to you, your soul is defective," wrote one self-proclaimed grunt blogger.

Bacon admits, "What I wasn't sure about was, it seemed like a lot of people were doing films about the Iraq war, and some were excellent films that people didn't want to see, you know? It kind of felt like the creative community had jumped the gun on content that we were still in the midst of. But I felt like this was such an interesting kind of approach, and I was convinced by the filmmakers that they weren't planning on making an Iraq movie per se. It was more about honor and sacrifice. It could have been about any war. It didn't specifically have a topical political agenda."

Now he's busy behind the cameras. "I'm getting an amazing education with someone else footing the bill," says Bacon, who also directed 2005's big screen "Loverboy" and the award-winning 1996 "Losing Chase" telepic. He reveals that he and Kyra are also developing two prospective series that they'd produce, one for TNT, the other for Showtime, and he'd direct as well. Not that he's forsaking acting. Next up, the Aug. 19 release "My One and Only" with Renee Zellweger. It's a tale from the life of actor George Hamilton's larger-than-life mother.

FOREIGN FLAVOR: Known in Denmark as "the man with 1,000 faces," handsome Copenhagen-born actor Thure Lindhardt has a long list of credits in his native land — including the riveting "Flame & Citron" WWII thriller that's now making its way into the States. He's also dabbled in Hollywood, with a role in Ron Howard's "Angels & Demons." "I would love it if I could work on both continents. That would definitely be my dream. I don't want to be one of those actors who moves to Los Angeles and works at a McDonald's. I'm too spoiled for that," says the blond Euro hottie jovially. "I had a great experience working in the States last year, and now there are a few independent films I may be doing." And, he says, he's awaiting word on a network pilot.

Lindhardt and Mads Mikkelsen are mesmerizing playing two real-life Danish resistance fighters/assassins during the Nazi occupation of Denmark in "Flame & Citron." Their code names form the title of the movie that's planned for limited release, in addition to being made available by IFC Films' video on demand. It's won acclaim abroad, especially in its home market, where it introduced youth to a chapter in history of which many weren't aware.

"These two guys were huge, national heroes after the war, but then the Danish politics of the 1950s and '60s said, 'We should not talk about these freedom fighters, the killings and who did what to whom.' When I grew up, no one really spoke of them. But we should discuss them. That's how I feel," he says. My grandparents were hiding Jews in their attic for weeks before they could get away to Sweden. A lot of people did things, risked their lives in quiet ways even if they didn't go out and fight. We're a country of five million people, and the Germans had 100 million, and when they came in with an army of a million, these people said, 'OK, we can't do everything, but we can do something.'"

ON THE PERSONAL SIDE: Dean Cain figures, "It remains to be seen" as to whether his son will ever attempt to follow him into the acting realm. However, "If he ever wants to be in the movies, I think we're doing something OK. If he likes it, then it's kind of fun. At 9, he's thinking of being a policeman, a fireman, maybe a professional athlete," adds Cain, who was a star college football player and signed with the Buffalo Bills before an injury sidelined him permanently. "Right now, he's thinking he wants to do a football movie and a soldier movie and have a police dog. He just finished third grade. He's a lot sweeter than I am. He's a lot more compassionate, which makes me happy."

With reports by Emily Feimster.

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.