The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 40

D2 Weekend The Boston Glob FRIDAY, MARCH 2, 2007 By Carol Beggy Mark Shanahan Radio station, Brown work out a deal 9T3 Bobby Brown was bailed out ofhis latest legal bind yester-' day by a Washington, D.C., radio station that's planning to put the Li singer to work for a week. Stating it is concerned about Brown's children, Hot 99.5, a Top 40 station owned by Clear Channel, cut the court a $22,000 check 1 "to cover the singer's overdue child-support payments and spring him from the Norfolk County House of Correction, where he spent three nights this week. "Bobby's not only a legend- ary, multiplatinum recording artist," said Kane, Hot 99.5's morning jock. "He's also a human being, and we decided we should put up the money for him and his kids." In exchange, the Roxbury- bred Brown has agreed, starting today, to go on the air for a week and talk honestly about the sub- stance abuse and other issues that derailed his once-promising career. "Hey, we recognize the power of an icon," Kane said.

Soon after he was set free by Judge Paula Carey, Brown telephoned Hot 99.5 from a men's bathroom to promote his radio appearance. Brown, 38, was back in court because he failed to make monthly $5,500 child-support payments for LaPrincia and Bobby HI, his two teenage children with former girlfriend Kim Ward. Separated from his wife of 14 years, Whitney Houston, Brown was picked up Sunday by police as he walked into Attleboro High School to see his daughter's cheerleading competition. The judge reluctantly agreed to let Ward take money from college funds Brown created for the kids, should the singer's child-support checks arrive late in the future. "I'm concerned about doing this, because Mr.

Brown has fallen off on a number of occasions in the past," Carey said. For all of his financial problems, Brown at least looked the part of a pop star yesterday, showing up in court with brother Tommy and attorney Phaedra Parks in a white Mercedes CLS 500, and wearing a snazzy pinstripe suit. "I'm doing a lot better in my life," he insisted afterward. "I'm moving forward." Brown will be on the air in DC this morning, and then the radio station is flying him home to LA to pick up some clothes. He'll be back on Hot 99.5 Monday.

Commiseration It was only a matter of time before Bridget Moynahan had a heart-to-heart with Mary-Louise Parker. The New York Post reported that the actresses were "deep in conversation" over breakfast the other day. Parker was eight months pregnant when her longtime boyfriend, Billy Crudup, ditched her for Claire Danes, and Moynahan broke up with Tom Brady around the time she learned she was carrying the Pats QB's baby. Marshall Crenshaw, who's playing tomorrow at the National Heritage Museum in Lexington, loves Boston because his last days as a fake Beatle were spent here. Crenshaw, who played John Lennon in the touring production of "Beatlemania," recalls he was gearing up to go it alone.

"On my way back to my hotel from the Shubert, I'd buy two coffees and a brownie and then I'd write a song in, like, 1 5 minutes," he said, laughing. "I was in a caffeine frenzy in Boston, but that's where I wrote 'Someday, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg is returning to his hometown of Medford as the speaker for Tufts University's May 20 graduation. Bloomberg and five others will receive honorary degrees. Leoni's ties to UNICEF run deep For actress Tea Leoni, being an ambassador for the US for UNICEF isn't just a 'passing endorsement. "UNICEF's role in the world is as a humanitarian organization.

We're not just there in times of crisis," said Leoni, whose grandmother Helenka Pantaleoni was a founder of the fund and whose father, Anthony Pantaleoni, serves on its board. Leoni was in Boston yesterday for I a reception at the Gamble Mansion on Commonwealth Avenue that was followed by a dinner at the Back Bay home of construction magnate Jay Cashman and An Irish favorite BILL BRETT FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE Brownstone needs renovation CTOP); ROSE LINCOLN FOR THE BOSTON GLOBE (LEFT) At some restaurants, multiple waiters comes standard and at others it's a sign of royal treatment. It's worth addressing the possibility that on this Thursday the treatment was, indeed, royal: maybe someone got wind that Brownstone was being written about. If that's true, then a lot of what emerged from the kitchen was unfit to print. That tartare, a trio of salmon, tuna, and steak, was hit and miss.

The salmon was served on a bird's nest of crunchy noodles. The tuna was pleasant but suffered the disadvantage of being inferior to two tuna tartares recently devoured at other restaurants. And the possibility arose that the steak When attentive become intrusive? does service A 1 fX 'I'l 'A l'i lp 1 -1 '( J- "-1 rrt past as "Father Ted," one of the sitcom history. Father Dougal. "I've tried over the years to resist that kind of pigeonholing and fight it as best as possible," he says.

"But finally you just have to go along with it and laugh at it." Ultimately, O'Hanlon is confident in his ability to defy people's expectations and not to worry about what they think coming into his shows. "A lot of people will come to see me because they do love the show 'Father Ted," and that's fair enough. I'm happy enough to get an audience. And it's my job once they come in to take them where I want to take them." Around town Jonathan Katz brings his "Working the Room" show to Jimmy Tingle's Off Broadway theater tonight and tomorrow. Dom Irrera plays the Comedy Connection tonight and tomorrow.

Dan Sally headlines the Comedy Studio tomorrow. tr" his wife, actress Christy Scott Cashman. "It's always nice to spend a night not covered in jelly and magic marker," said the mother of two. But it's not all fancy parties catered by top chefs, including Anthony Susi, Dante de Magistris, and Marc Orfaly. Leoni has traveled with her father to Honduras and Vietnam to observe the programs sponsored by the 60-year-old children's charity.

"It's important that every ambassador travel in the field," said Leoni, who is married to actor David Duchov-ny. "We can see what the needs are and speak to that." Ardal O'Hanlon can't escape his most beloved characters in BBC decade after its final season, "Ted" is still popular enough to have started a feud between two of the Aran Islands, where many of the show's outdoor scenes were filmed, over who would host a "Friends of Ted" festival dedicated to the show. "It's a bizarre thing, held on one of the most remote and inhospitable islands off the coast of Ireland," says O'Hanlon in clear be-musement. "You have these thou sands of pilgrims dressed as priests and nuns and bishops descending on this tiny island." The major drawback is that O'Hanlon is often typecast as a likable dolt an "eejit," as it's called closer to home. He's taken breaks from stand-up to write a novel and explore other film and TV work, but he eventually finds his way back to some variation of 1 i I r' Comic and political satirist Jimmy Tingle joined Sena tor Ted Kennedy, Governor Deval Patrick, and funnymen Denis Leary and Lenny Clarke in sending well-wishes marking cable news channel NECN's 15th anniversary.

Comic Dom Irrera dined at Strega Ristorante in the North End the other night before his shows at the Comedy Connection in Faneuil Hall Marketplace. Names can be reached at names globe.com or at 61 7-929-8253. By contrast, the pureed orange vegetable that was served with the pork chop was so smooth it was difficult to taste whether it was squash or sweet potato. Incidentally, a blind taste test between the scallops and the pork would have produced surprising results. Brownstone used to be the middling Tex-Mex spot Prairie Star.

Maybe it's more impressive to have four flat-screen televisions showing the same college basketball game than culinary upgrades. Forget the NCAA, that's real March madness. Brownstone's owners' other holdings are pubs such as the Black Rose, Hurricane O'Reilly's, and Clery's, the oft-packed watering hole just next door. These are more social destinations than culinary ones. But Brownstone, with its Morton's Steakhouse-esque dark-wood motif, seems to aspire to more than burgers and roast chicken.

The chalkboard outside the entrance practically boasted about those scallops. (So cruel.) It's possible the people behind this place can live with the mediocrity. Yet it seems unthinkable that so much attention paid to clearing the tables is preferable to wowing the people dining at them. Brownstone, 111 Dartmouth 617-867-4142. Entrees wines by the glass real growth probably." Carson said he was also "very pleased" with WHDH's performance.

Channel 7 finished second in many periods, including at 6 p.m. (184,100 viewers vs. Channel 5's 220,000 viewers) and 5 a.m. (29,000 viewers vs. Channel 5's 57,400 viewers).

WBZ, which has struggled for years to improve its ratings, reported growth in many time peri-' ods, although its overall rankings were mostly in third place. It did place second at 5 a.m. behind Channel 5 (45,000 viewers vs. Channel 5's which was a 36 percent increase from last year. It was in third place at 5 p.m.

with 110,000 viewers (a 25 percent increase from last year) compared to Channel 5's 215,300 viewers and Channel 7's 124,000 viewers. In a statement, WBZ president and general manager Ed Piette said he was "encouraged" by the station's overall growth from a year ago. portion was secretly Spam. About the plate of lollipop chicken: where on the chicken is the lollipop? Short ribs came served on a long bone, an irresistible accompaniment for aspiring cavemen. But the rib itself was tougher and less moist than it appeared.

The scallops special was over-seared so that the supple meatiness was comically stiff. Funnier was the idea of serving scallops with mashed potatoes. There is probably a way that pairing makes sense, but it seems like creating a side of potatoes that can't double as a sealant would be a good start. prays for laughs ByNickA.ZainoIII GLOBE CORRESPONDENT Ardal O'Hanlon is a comic icon in the United Kingdom. His Father Dougal McGuire, from "Fa- Comedy tner Ted" is one of the most beloved "0teS characters in BBC sitcom history, and he started one of the first "alternative" comedy rooms, Dublin's Comedy Cellar, back in 1988.

In Dublin or London, he could fill thousand-seat theaters with no problem. In Boston, where people may have seen his half-hour Comedy Central special or a rerun of "Father Ted" audiences will be treated to a more intimate four-night stand at the Burren in Davis Square starting Thursday. Not that O'Hanlon minds a smaller room. "I'd play anywhere," he says, speaking by phone from Dublin. IT not fussy at all.

Particularly in the States, where I wouldn't have 'I1' sort a profile. I'll stand on a box on a street corner. It's just for the adventure, really, for the hell of it." The show is part of a series tZ called "Off the Boat Comedy," or- 'ganized by local comic Brian Joyce, who hopes to tap into a Throwing pool of Irish comics who -I haven't had much opportunity to play America. "I played the Irish Jircuit for almost two years," says Joyce, "and in that time I realized two things there are a lot of Irish comedians, and very 5 Iew them have performed in I-C Boston." CV O'Hanlon isn't sure what his wJiostori audience will look like. He Ihas only played a handful of gigs 2C in America, mostly in New York, "v'ivhen he taped his Comedy Cen- tral special in 2001, -he enjoyed his rela- By Wesley Morris GLOBE STAFF Brownstone, an iffy new after-work spot on Dartmouth Street (yes, another one), raises a com-pelling philosophical bailee question about a well-run restaurant.

When does attentive service become intrusive? And when does intrusive service start to seem incompetent? On a recent busy Thursday evening, the woman who arrived at a table of three to take the drink order was not the same woman who had taken the drink order two minutes earlier. The woman who brought the drinks was not the woman who took the order or the one who tried to. Someone else entirely inquired about the first course. A few minutes later, someone else explained that the first woman was being trained, but since she rarely returned it was unclear what she was being trained to do. Her replacements were nice all five of them, including the woman who does the seating and the man who does the managing.

This is the sort of attention you want after a boyfriend dumps you or when you're on the verge of repeating the third grade. Having a fleet of servers deliver a triple tar-tare appetizer and decently pre-i pared leg of duck confit is disconcerting. In exasperation, a budding combat strategist called the attention "flooding the zone." Channel 5 By Suzanne C. Ryan GLOBE STAFF WCVB-TV (Channel 5) beat its competition in total viewers in every time period during the television industry's important February sweeps period, the station reported yesterday, including at 1 1 p.m.,- when WHDH-TV (Channel 7) has long been a sweeps winner. "Everybody is very excited about the book," said Bill Fine, president and general manager of WCVB.

"This is an extremely competitive market. To have viewers select us as their preferred station from morning until night is quite an achievement." WFXT-TV (Channel 25) also had news to crow about yesterday. Its 10 p.m. newscast attracted more viewers during sweeps than any of its late-night competitors. "Fox25 News at 10" had an average of 238,000 total viewers.

Its competitor, WLVI-TV's (Channel 56) "7 News at 10," attracted just 50,000 viewers for its first sweep sweeps the competition since the Tribune Company sold the CW56 to Sunbeam Television Corp. last year. At 11 p.m., WCVB had 220,700 viewers, WHDH had 199,900 viewers, and WBZ-TV (Channel 4) had 178,000 viewers. "This sweep set a new record for the highest-rated performance the station has ever had," said Gregg Kelley, WFXT's general manager and vice president. Kelley downplayed the impact of "American Idol" as a lead-in.

'Idol' has been on for five years now. Our growth is more reflective of viewers appreciating the value of our newscast." Mike Carson, vice president and general manager of WHDH and WLVI, said he has "very realistic expectations" about WLVTs progress at 10 p.m., especially considering WLVI is an affiliate of the fledgling CW network. "A lot of people don't know we're available yet," he said. "But the product looks great. It will be next fall before we start seeing Ardal O'Hanlon is at the Burren March 8-11 at 7:30 p.m.

Tickets For more information, call 617-776-6896 or gotoburren.com. -tive anonymity on nhe New York club scene. "That was just I -1 a fantastic challenge, and it was a great way to learn about own material and what works and what doesn't," he says. 1 The popularity ZK(j "Father Ted," which ran from Zl 1995 to 1998 on the BBC, has de- -'stroyed O'Hanlon's ability to go unrecognized in Britain. Nearly a.