Bridget, Rosie share family ties

Bridget Moynahan and Rosie O'Donnell related? Apparently. Appearing yesterday on ``The View," Tom Brady's belle said she and Rosie are distant cousins. Bridge, who was promoting her new ABC series ``Six Degrees," also said she'd like to settle down and start a family. The actress, 36, said she woke up to the potential pleasures of parenthood while watching happily married man Will Smith work on ``I, Robot." ``I thought, `Why can't I have that?' " said Moynahan. Yeah, Tom, why can't she? Moynahan also mused about watching her boyfriend perform on game day, confessing that she sometimes gets nervous and nibbles her nails.

Syndication’s not for Severin

Why would Jay Severin give up a lucrative syndication deal to come back to Boston? Severin, who ditched his deal with CBS Radio less than a year after he signed it, insists it's simple: He likes it here, and Greater Media Inc. is making it worth his while. But is it that straightforward? Maybe, says Michael Harrison, publisher of Talkers magazine. ``I wouldn't say Jay was a smash right out of the box, but he was off and running on a successful syndication career," said Harrison, commenting on yesterday's news that the highly rated talk jock is returning to the region to reclaim his drive-time show on 96.9. (Severin is even selling his Sag Harbor, N.Y., home and moving to the North Shore.) ``It's a myth that syndication is a step up from success in a major market like Boston," said Harrison. And CBS Radio is having problems and recently laid off 115 folks. Meanwhile, Greater Media CEO Peter Smyth says Severin's arrival will shuffle the station's lineup but Mike Barnicle isn't going anywhere. ``Not as long as I'm running this station," he said.

WGBH wins a trio of Emmys

Boston's PBS station WGBH won three awards at the 27th annual news and documentary Emmys held Monday night in New York by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. Executive producer David Fanning's ``Frontline: The Storm," which was coproduced out of Boston with RAINmedia, won for continuing coverage of a news story. ``Frontline: The Torture Question," by Fanning, director/producer Michael Kirk, and reporter/coproducer Jim Gilmore, which was coproduced by the Boston station and Kirk Documentary Group, won the Emmy for outstanding investigative journalism. And ``Rx for Survival: A Global Health Challenge," which Paula S. Apsell's WGBH/Nova Science Unit coproduced with Vulcan Productions, won for outstanding informational programming. WGBH's three Emmys were among five won by the PBS network.

Liz Walker recently chatted in Boston with ``Without a Trace" costar Eric Close in an interview that will air Sunday morning on CBS 4.

"Simply Ming" host chef Ming Tsai stopped by the Dunkin' Donuts test kitchen in Canton to film a segment with culinary technologist Bob Pitts and executive chef Stan Frankenthaler about -- what else? -- doughnuts.

She won't be at the events tomorrow and Friday in Newport, but Renee Zellweger signed her favorite Louis Vuitton Le Fabuleux handbag (which sells for $3,450, without the Oscar winner's autograph) to be part of a dinner/auction to benefit children's programs at Boston's Joslin Diabetes Center. The ``Newport Under the Stars" dinner will honor Casey Johnson (of the Johnson & Johnson family), who has type 1 diabetes. Also scheduled to attend the two days of events are reality TV ``It" couple Rob Mariano and Amber Brkich , Lauren Holly from ``NCIS," Amy Davidson of ``8 Simple Rules," Willie Garson of ``Sex and the City," Greg Lindsay from ``Las Vegas," MTV VJ and Methuen gal Susie Castillo, and Red Sox legend Luis Tiant. The celebs who've pitched in to honor Johnson include: Rick and Kathy Hilton and daughter Nicky, actress Lindsay Lohan, and Kevin Connolly from HBO's ``Entourage."

Jazz singer Cassandre McKinley and Boston pianist Brad Hatfield, who'll play together at Scullers tomorrow, caught up with Clint Eastwood while they were performing at the Monterey Jazz Festival earlier this month. Hatfield, the solo pianist for the ``Mystic River" theme on the movie's soundtrack, played a little bit from the piece for Eastwood, who directed the movie and composed the score.

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