Hack

Reprinted from the Sept. 15 issue The Hack: Under felony indictment. Booted from his house and family and the police force after stealing drug money. Out some cash because the Eagles actually won a game. Badgered by his buddy, a priest named Grzelak, to atone before God. Forced to drive a crummy cab because the Chechen dispatcher doesn't like him. Still, it might be fun to be The Hack. First, you've got this Clint Eastwood movie moniker: The Hack. Then you actually get to act like Clint Eastwood, so viewers never think about the implication of mediocrity in your name.

This used to be a noble profession. Still is, to tell you the truth. To hear an editor debate whether a story is fair to some deplorable individual most would consider unworthy of the effort or to watch a reporter rush toward danger to tell a story that needs telling is to be unalterably convinced of the honor in this work. But even in the saying, you brace for the derision and scorn - according to Gallup, the public ranks journalists between auto mechanics and lawyers in terms of ethics - that will surely follow.

The festering Saw is a locked-room horror film. A haughty surgeon (Cary Elwes) and an angry slacker (Leigh Whannel, also Saw's scriptwriter) wake up chained to the walls in a filthy dungeon. Between them lies a dead man, an apparent suicide. A tape informs Elwes that he must kill his cell mate in an allotted time or his wife (Monica Potter) and daughter will meet violent ends. Both men are provided with hacksaws, too dull for the chains but sharp enough for flesh. Eventually it occurs to the doctor that their situation has all the hallmarks of the Jigsaw Killer, a notorious madman who devises sick traps for his victims.

SO MUCH television, so little time: Two of my favorite actors - and the former co-stars of the Philadelphia-set "Hack" - popped up on two of my favorite shows this week. Andre Braugher ("Men of a Certain Age") made a return appearance to Fox's "House" in one of those therapy sessions that seem to take place as much in the mind of Dr. House (Hugh Laurie) as in the real world of 50-minute hours that don't include flashback footage. But it was Philadelphia's David Morse - who had his own memorable arc on "House" - whom I hadn't necessarily expected to see turn up in New Orleans on HBO's "Treme.

I've had an affinity for cabdrivers ever since my early years as a Philadelphia schoolteacher, when I spent eight summers driving a yellow cab on our city streets. That's why I was delighted when I was accepted as an extra on the TV show Hack last fall after an open casting call. I've been in four episodes of the show, about a disgraced police officer turned cabbie, and played a different role in each. In one, I was told that I would portray a customer in an upscale, conservative men's clothing store.

The Hack: Under felony indictment. Booted from his house and family and the police force after stealing drug money. Out some cash because the Eagles actually won a game. Badgered by his buddy, a priest named Grzelak, to atone before God. Forced to drive a crummy cab because the Chechen dispatcher doesn't like him. Still, it might be fun to be The Hack. First, you've got this Clint Eastwood movie moniker: The Hack. Then you actually get to act like Clint Eastwood, so viewers never think about the implication of mediocrity in your name.

Welcome to the glamorous world of network television. Out in West Philadelphia, CBS is shooting Hack on Aug. 14, a day when a fry cook would need only a spatula to open up business right on the sidewalk. It is sweltering. And director Harry Winer has appropriated the only shade on 42d Street just south of Girard Avenue, sitting under a portable canopy and watching on a pair of monitors as stars David Morse and Andre Braugher rehearse and shoot the same scene over and over. Makeup artists hover near the actors like remora fish around sharks, running up every few seconds with paper towels to blot sweat off their faces.

A friend of ours had one of those longest days recently. She was headed home after giving a lecture in Villanova, feeling tired and cranky as the commuter rail ambled back to town that rainy evening. Because of the weather and the hour - which was 11 p.m. - she decided to detrain at 30th Street Station, where there is a cab stand, rather than getting off at Suburban Station and walking home to 19th and Pine. When she attempted to open the door of the red-and-yellow taxi at the head of the line, she found it locked.

The durable professional marriage between novelist Stephen King and Hollywood continues with "The Dark Half," the latest of King's works to be adapted for the screen. Fans of "Misery" will recognize the basic story of "The Dark Half" - an evil entity forcing a writer to crank out hack novels. Timothy Hutton stars as Thad Beaumont, a failed novelist and lecturer who makes a secret and successful living writing violent action novels under the assumed name George Stark. When a blackmailer theatens to expose the respected professor's mildly sleazy secret identity, Beaumont decides to go public - taking credit for the popular novels and vowing never to write another.

Legislators in Harrisburg seem to be operating on what might be called "political hack time" these days. It's a pace that causes economic damage to a state because its politicians simply can't get off the dime. In this case it's somewhat more than a dime they need to get off of; it's $23 million that has to be authorized to enlarge railroad tunnel and bridge openings along the old Delaware & Hudson (D&H) railroad tracks that connect Philadelphia to western Canada. The Canadian Pacific, which took over the D&H with the help of $5 million from the state, expects to expand significantly the amount of freight it moves through Philadelphia, once it becomes possible to move trains out of the port that include "double-stack" cars.

LONDON - One of Rupert Murdoch's most trusted lieutenants and five people close to her were charged Tuesday with conspiring to hide evidence of phone hacking, bringing the scandal that has raged across Britain's media and political elite uncomfortably close to Prime Minister David Cameron. The charges against former tabloid editor Rebekah Brooks, her husband, Charlie, and four aides are the first prosecutions since police reopened inquiries 18 months ago into wrongdoing by the country's scandal-hungry press.

LONDON - Former editor Rebekah Brooks drew Prime Minister David Cameron closer into Britain's tabloid phone hacking scandal Friday, saying he had offered her some support after the uproar over illegal journalistic practices forced her to quit. Brooks, who resigned in July as chief executive of News International, Rupert Murdoch's British newspaper division, detailed her close friendships with Cameron, former Prime Minister Tony Blair, and their families, in testimony to the country's inquiry into media ethics.

LONDON - Rupert Murdoch apologized Thursday for the phone-hacking scandal that has tarnished his global media empire, declaring: "The buck stops with me. " But he also blamed underlings at News Corp. for keeping him in the dark and trying to keep a lid on evidence of widespread hacking at the News of the World tabloid, which he shut down in July when the scandal broke wide open. On his second day testifying before a British judicial inquiry on media ethics, the Australian-born tycoon said he had spent "hundreds of millions of dollars" on the legal fallout of the hacking allegations and on cleaning up his newspapers.

'THE BIG MISS," indeed. It did not have to be. Hank Haney's book about Tiger Woods did not have to further diminish the most significant athlete alive. It did not have to paint Woods as detestable. It did not need to depict Haney as a spurned sycophant, now turned disloyal and petty. That is what it does. On the eve of the Masters, where Tiger once reigned and where, revived, he could again, Haney and his publishers decided to release 247 pages of revenge.

LONDON - Police investigating Britain's phone-hacking scandal swooped down on a number of homes in an early-morning raid Tuesday and arrested six people, including a woman widely identified as Rebekah Brooks, the former head of Rupert Murdoch's British newspapers. Scotland Yard said five men and the woman were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, a more serious charge than phone hacking. That suggests that the authorities' probe into the scandal has broadened to include an investigation into a possible cover-up by employees and executives at Murdoch-owned News International.

LONDON - Rupert Murdoch's News International has settled nearly all the cases against the company in the first wave of lawsuits for phone hacking by its journalists, with a new round of apologies and payouts announced Wednesday in a London court. But a potentially damaging claim lodged by British singer Charlotte Church is still headed to trial later this month and a wave of new lawsuits - as many as 56 in all - is looming, lawyers told London's High Court. News International, a division of News Corp., has tried hard to keep the phone-hacking cases from going to trial, launching its own compensation program and paying out millions of pounds in out-of-court settlements.

"After extensive deliberations with the board, I recommended to them that I was no longer the right person to lead Sunoco as it progresses to the next phase of its future. " - Lynn L. Elsenhans, announcing she will step down as chief executive officer of Sunoco Inc. after leading the Philadelphia company in winding down its oil-refining businesses. "She was brought here to do something, she did it, and now she's going. I know a couple thousand people who wouldn't mind helping her pack.

Al Attles' favorite memory of Wilt Chamberlain: The legendary 100-point game he produced for the Philadelphia Warriors against the Knicks on March 2, 1962. But Attles, who attends every Warriors home game, also remembers being on hand just days earlier when Chamberlain - his former teammate - set a record with 34 free-throw attempts. Attles never expected either record to be broken in his lifetime. But there he was Thursday night, watching as Dwight Howard stepped to the foul line time and again in the Magic's 117-109 victory at Golden State.

LONDON - A former top lawyer for Rupert Murdoch's British newspapers insisted Wednesday that he told the mogul's son there was evidence of widespread phone hacking at the now-defunct News of the World tabloid. Tom Crone questioned contentions made by James Murdoch - chairman of News International, the British arm of his father's media empire - that he had not been informed about an e-mail indicating that hacking was rife. For months, News International insisted the illegal accessing of the cellphone voice messages of celebrities and crime victims was confined to reporter Clive Goodman, who, along with private investigator Glenn Mulcaire, was jailed in 2007.

LONDON - They couldn't be more different - the handsome, world-famous actor and the quiet parents who endured unspeakable tragedy. But together they've become the most public faces of Britain's phone-hacking scandal, and Monday they testified about their run-ins with this country's ferociously competitive tabloid press. For Hugh Grant, it was the paparazzi who wouldn't stop harassing the mother of his child for photos and the gossip rag that allegedly accessed his phone messages and wrongly concluded that he was cheating on his girlfriend.