After hours with Scorsese

Is there anyone more fanatical about film than Martin Scorsese? While in Boston preparing to shoot "Ashecliffe," the celebrated director will be spending his free time watching movies. We're told Scorsese and leading man Leonardo DiCaprio have reached a deal with a few local cinemas to screen movies after hours. Apparently, the pair want to watch spooky genre films (as they did last week at the Harvard Film Archive). Based on Dennis Lehane's book "Shutter Island," "Ashecliffe" is about the hunt for a murderess who has escaped from a mental hospital. The movie, which will be shooting here for four months, stars DiCaprio, Michelle Williams, Mark Ruffalo, and Patricia Clarkson.

While family and friends of the late Jess Cain are gathering in Hingham today to mourn the former talk-show host, WROR's Loren Owens and Wally Brine will be hosting an on-air tribute to the Boston broadcasting legend. Joining the pair this morning will be John "Pudge" Flynn, who was Cain's producer for 17 years. We're told a bigger tribute is being planned that'll bring together colleagues and competitors alike, including Marjorie Clapprood, Pat Whitley, Nick Mills, Peter Casey, Anne-Marie Aigner, Peter Meade, Jordan Rich, Bev Tilden, Listo Fisher, and Susan Wornick.

The snow didn't just snarl traffic. Unfortunately, it also forced the Museum of Fine Arts to cancel last night's screening of "The Holy Modal Rounders . . . Born to Lose," a documentary about the obscure '60s band led by fiddler Peter Stampfel and guitarist Steve Weber. (The film features Dennis Hopper, Wavy Gravy, and playwright Sam Shepard, who was a drummer in the Rounders.) Following last night's film, the band planned to jam with Shepard, but the concert was also canceled.

Tom Hanks is on his way here. Word is the Oscar winner will be in Boston March 7 to host a reception and screening of "John Adams," the HBO miniseries based on historian David McCullough's Pulitzer Prize-winning bio of the second US president. Hanks is the co-executive producer of the series, which stars Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney.

These are dark days for the music business, and no one knows that better than Richard Blackstone (above), former CEO of Warner/Chappell Music Publishing. Blackstone was at Berklee yesterday, where he delivered the college's annual Zafris Distinguished Lecture for Music Business/Management. A glass-half-full kind of guy, Blackstone's talk was titled "The Music Business in Transition: Disruption With Optimism."

Imagine Renee Giunta's surprise yesterday when she opened her front door in Maynard, and discovered Ty Pennington standing there. The host of ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" came calling because the Giuntas are the well-deserving recipients of a new dream home. "I'm in heaven," Giunta told us afterward. "I can't believe this is happening." It's about time the Giuntas enjoyed a little good luck. Two years ago - the same day the couple's youngest child was born - Renee's husband, Paul, was in a devastating car accident. The doctors predicted Giunta wouldn't walk or talk - if he survived at all. Two years later, he's doing both, but not at home because the Giuntas' home isn't wheelchair accessible. Enter Pennington and the TV show's team of design pros. For the next seven days, 500 folks, including Acton's Fenton Contracting, will be completely rebuilding the Giuntas' home, repairing floors, widening doorways, and renovating pipes and electrical systems. "It's going to be a good old-fashioned barn-raising," said the show's interior designer extraordinaire Michael Moloney. "This is a family that has so much hope and received so much support from the community." Renee Giunta said she and her sister-in-law applied to be on the show more than a year ago, but doubted they'd be picked. "My husband has beaten all the odds, and now he's coming home," she said. "It's awesome."

The great Alvin Epstein was in town this week rehearsing his role in the Actors' Shakespeare Project's upcoming production of "The Tempest." The industrious actor, who plays Prospero in the play, is dividing his time between Cambridge and New York, where he's about to costar with Elaine Stritch and John Turturro in a production of Samuel Beckett's "Endgame." . . . Meanwhile, we weren't surprised to see "Law & Order" actor Sam Waterston in the audience at "Julius Caesar" at the ART. After all, Waterston's son James plays Mark Anthony in the show.

The stars of the movie "Blindsight" - six blind teenage mountain climbers from Tibet - paid a visit yesterday to the Carroll Center for the Blind in Newton, where they were introduced to some of the center's adaptive technology. Accompanying the kids was Sabriye Tenberken, founder of Braille Without Borders where the teens go to school.

Names can be reached at names@globe.com or at 617-929-8253.