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Inqlings: 'Pelham' helmer's next stop: Here

Filmmaker Tony Scott, whose The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 is new in theaters, has been here to location-scout for another rail-themer.

Actor Terrence Howard and son Hunter sell lemonade outside the Ritz-Carltonin Center City for a charity- Alex's, not Electrolux's. (See "Feeling the squeeze.")
Actor Terrence Howard and son Hunter sell lemonade outside the Ritz-Carltonin Center City for a charity- Alex's, not Electrolux's. (See "Feeling the squeeze.")Read moreHUGHE DILLON / For The Inquirer

Filmmaker

Tony Scott

, whose

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

is new in theaters, has been here to location-scout for another rail-themer.

It's Unstoppable, a 20th Century Fox drama about a runaway train carrying toxic chemicals. Pelham's Denzel Washington and Chris Pine (Kirk in the Star Trek prequel) are on board, and it's pegged to shoot across Pennsylvania this fall.

Scott (Top Gun, Days of Thunder, Beverly Hills Cop II) was spotted Friday with associates enjoying dinner at the Water Works.

Also in production:

Tony Danza was in talks last week with officials about teaching at a Philly school for an A&E reality series, as I noted in Thursday's column. More background: In March, Danza shot the pilot at Gorton High School in Yonkers, N.Y., but members of the Yonkers school board "decided it was not something they wanted to pursue," said Jerilynne Fierstein, the district's communication officer. "He was wonderful with the kids," Fierstein added. She declined to say why the board nixed the idea. Philadelphia city and school officials did comment on the pending deal.

Neil Patrick Harris shot a scene for the comedy The Best and the Brightest on Friday in Rittenhouse Square. The square doubled as Central Park.

FX's It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia spent Tuesday through Friday shooting scenes for its fifth season, using such spots as the Italian Market and Dave & Buster's. South Philly-raised creator and star Rob McElhenney joked that a World Series-flashback episode will include a battle pitting Charlie Day as his alter ego, Green Man, against the Phillie Phrenetic. Um, Mac, you mean the Phanatic? "No," McElhenney said. "We have a great relationship with the Phillies, but [Major League Baseball] is very careful about the brand."

Generous regifting

Do-gooders

Gerry and Marguerite Lenfest

got $25,000 last month when they won the prestigious Philadelphia Award. On Thursday, the cable pioneers passed along the honorarium to the

Marian Anderson

Historical Society, which mentors vocal classical artists. Anderson, the contralto from South Philly (1897-1993), received the Philadelphia Award in 1940.

Feeling the squeeze

Competition - in the nonprofit world? Now there are

two

campaigns based on lemonade stands.

For nearly a decade, there has been the Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation, inspired by Alexandra Scott, who at age 4 in 2000 set up a lemonade stand at her home to raise money to fight childhood cancers. The Wynnewood girl raised $1 million before her death in 2004, and parents Jay and Liz Scott are continuing the fight.

On Monday, at the height of the foundation's annual fund-raising blitz, Electrolux rolled out a national campaign to help the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund. The appliance maker and its spokeswoman, South Jersey-bred talk-show host Kelly Ripa, are calling for people to create online lemonade stands.

Electrolux, promising $500,000 to the fund, has done similar charitable endeavors, but none involving beverages.

"The timing struck me as unusual," said Liz Scott, making lemonade out of what one might call a lemon. "Then I stepped back and realized they're also doing a good thing."

Mary Kay Kopf, chief marketing officer of Electrolux Major Appliances North America, said through a spokeswoman: "We applaud a decade of Alex's 'Original' Lemonade Stand efforts and wish them continued success. We support all efforts to raise funds and awareness for cancer research."

CBS3 said it received $891,740 in pledges Thursday at its 15-hour Alex's phone bank. On Friday, actor Terrence Howard and son Hunter, 13, sold $3,000 worth of lemonade in two hours at 10 Arts at the Ritz-Carlton hotel. Howard also kicked in $500 from his own pocket.

Peter, Paul but no Mary

Mary Travers

is reportedly in a hospital with a respiratory infection, so she isn't leaving on a jet plane for tonight's concert at the Kimmel Center.

Peter Yarrow

and

Noel "Paul" Stookey

will perform as a duo. Those who wish to receive a full refund can call 215-893-1999. This show was postponed from Nov. 23, when Travers fell ill.

TV info

Action News

alumna

SallyAnn Mosey

- released over the winter by New York's WNBC - visited CBS3 and Fox29 on Thursday, and she and Fox29 news director

Kingsley Smith

lunched at Buddakan. Both stations, whose weather staffs are flush, played down the meteorologist's visit. "We have lots of meetings with lots of people," said a Fox spokeswoman. Before joining WPVI, Mosey worked at WTNH in Connecticut, previous stop of CBS3's new general manager,

Jon Hitchcock

.

It's been about a month since Gary Papa appeared on Action News, and a station rep offered no details Friday on the return of the sports director, who has been recovering from cancer surgery. Speaking of 6ABC, after more than 60 years, you can no longer hear its audio on FM radio at 87.7 after Friday's DTV switch. Not the station's decision. It's how the TV frequencies have been realigned.

Billie Jean King will turn up on the news this week. The tennis legend is to appear Thursday in a media day at the Wachovia Spectrum, hitting a few against newsies such as CBS3's Beasley Reece and Fox29's Hugh Douglas. She's plugging the Freedoms tennis team, which will play outside the King of Prussia mall in July.

NBC10 weekend anchor John Blunt wraps his 25 years this week. He accepted a buyout.

Lou Busico, lawyer for Bonnie Sweeten, the Bucks County woman accused of phoning in a kidnapping hoax and implicating two black men before jetting with one of her daughters to Walt Disney World, explains that his client is not a racist. In an It's Your Call sit-down with the Comcast Network's Lynn Doyle, premiering at 8:30 p.m. today, Busico insists that Sweeten used "the two elderly black men in the sedan in front of her as convenient subjects when she was making the 911 call. . . . If two twentysomething whites had been in the car in front of her, she would have used that as potential suspects. She apologizes for any implication of racial stereotype. She's in mental-health treatment now."