toledoblade.com --

PASADENA, Calif. - Donnie Wahlberg, who starred in HBO's Band of Brothers and NBC's Boomtown, has been added to the cast of Spike TV's Pittsburgh-set drama The Kill Pit.

Director Steve Shill, a veteran of The Wire, Deadwood, and Law & Order: Criminal Intent, will helm the first four episodes when the series begins production in Pittsburgh in mid-March.

Wahlberg, most recently seen in the short-lived CW drama Runaway, will star opposite John Leguizamo, who plays an Iraq War veteran who stages a bank robbery in downtown Pittsburgh. Wahlberg portrays the chief negotiator who tries to coax Leguizamo's character out of the hostage situation that ensues.

"My character is young and confident and a little quirky," Wahlberg said this week before a session at the TV critics press tour for his upcoming A&E movie Kings of South Beach. "He's got some obsessive-compulsive things. He's sort of this cocky negotiator and thinks this is going to be a textbook negotiation but what is about to unfold is much bigger than anyone can imagine. Suddenly this guy is going to be faced with the biggest challenge of his career. His quirks and idiosyncrasies become even more fun for me as an actor."

Wahlberg said he was drawn to The Kill Pit by more than the script, because, he acknowledged, the concept is similar to other recent series.

"It's not the most unique subject matter, but it has the potential to turn into a Dog Day Afternoon-type of thing. Hearing where the show is going after the pilot is very exciting. For me to be able to go toe-to-toe with John Leguizamo, with a good writer at the helm, it makes it a little irresistible."

The Kill Pit writer James DeMonaco also wrote Hate, a 2005 Showtime pilot in which Wahlberg almost starred. Wahlberg's second film, 1998's Body Count, starred Leguizamo along with David Caruso, Ving Rhames, Forest Whitaker, and Linda Fiorentino. Wahlberg said Leguizamo was one of the most influential actors he's ever worked with.

"Early on, I was just finding my way on movie sets and that was a lower budget movie with some issues in terms of logistics and filming and a young director. As the production ran into problems, I had all these expert actors to look to and all of them responded to problems in different ways," Wahlberg said. "John's response was to just keep working hard and stay in character and make his character the best it could be. I used that as my guideline. To me he's the best thing in that movie and you know why? Because he never stopped working."

Animal Planet's Saving Grace will premiere as a 30-minute special March 5 about efforts to save an abandoned 6-week-old otter. The show will continue with a series of 20 five-minute online segments at AnimalPlanet.com, concluding with another 30-minute episode on-air on March 30.

The Block News Alliance consists of The Blade and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Rob Owen, the TV editor for the Post-Gazette, is attending the Television Critics Association winter press tour in Los Angeles.

Contact him at:
rowen@post-gazette.com

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