Pacino's leading lady

Derek Walcott, the Nobel Prize-winning poet and former BU professor, has withdrawn his name from consideration for a prestigious teaching post at Oxford University. Several British newspapers reported yesterday that Walcott, who retired from Boston University in 2007, pulled out after more than 100 Oxford academics were anonymously sent photocopied pages detailing a sexual-harassment claim made against Walcott by a Harvard student in 1982, and a harassment suit filed in 1996 by a BU student. (The harassment case was settled out of court.) Walcott could not be reached last night, but he told the London Evening Standard: "I am disappointed that such low tactics have been used in this election, and I do not want to get into a race for a post where it causes embarrassment to those who have chosen to support me for the role, or to myself. I already have a great many work commitments, and while I was happy to be put forward for the post, if it has degenerated into a low and degrading attempt at character assassination, I do not want to be part of it." Along with poets Ruth Padel and Arvind Krishna Mehrotra, Walcott was on the short list to become Oxford's next professor of poetry. A BU spokesman told us Walcott is no longer affiliated with the school. He remains prominently featured on the website of BU's Boston Playwrights' Theatre, which he founded in 1981.

Before his team took the floor last night, Celts owner Wyc Grousbeck shared a frosty beverage with wealthy Irish businessman Dermot Desmond at The Banshee on Dot Ave. Desmond is an owner of the Scottish Premier League soccer team Celtic Football Club, and together the two Celts owners watched Desmond's team beat Dundee FC. (Also in the bar was Bill Ramsey, chairman of Boston's Celtics Supporters Club.) Later, Desmond was Wyc's guest at the other Celtics game. Others at the game included Pats players Tully Banta-Cain, Kevin Faulk, Gary Guyton, Jarvis Green, Laurence Maroney, Brandon Meriweather, Fred Taylor, Wes Welker, Seahawk Lofa Tatupu, Governor Deval Patrick, poker player Annie Duke, Ellen Pompeo's husband, Chris Ivery, singer Livingston Taylor, Sox marketing man Sam Kennedy, and shortstop Jed Lowrie.

At last, "TV Diner" executive producer Jenny Johnson is getting her own show. NECN announced yesterday that Johnson, whose "Jenny Cam" makes "TV Diner" worth watching, is the new host of New England Dream House. The show, which airs Sundays at 10:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. and weekdays at 3 p.m., was formerly anchored by Beth Shelburne. In a statement yesterday, NECN president Charlie Kravetz called Johnson "a shining new star in Boston television," and we don't disagree. Her first show is May 31.

Jason Varitek's divorce trial did not start on Monday, as planned. Varitek v. Varitek was set to begin in Georgia's Gwinnett County Court bright and early, but local clerks said the case didn't make it onto Judge Melodie Snell Connor's docket. Jason and Karen Varitek will most likely get a new court date for next month, clerks said.

The selling of Aerosmith continues. The band, which struck gold when it let Guitar Hero use its hits in a video game, is now partnering with a gaming technology company to create lotteries based on "Dream On" and its other chart-topping tunes. Billboard.com reports that Toxic Twins Steven Tyler and Joe Perry have a deal with GTECH, which is offering lottery operators a series of games, including scratch-off cards featuring the band's songs, logo, and images. (Prizes include concert tickets, backstage passes, and memorabilia.) Said Adam Lowenberg of Primary Wave Music, the band's publisher: "Aerosmith is very much interested in establishing new precedents, whether it's Guitar Hero or the Rock & Roll Roller Coaster or even, going back in history, to mixing rock and rap," he said. "They really get off on being first." And rich. Rhode Island and New Hampshire are set to create Aerosmith-theme lotteries this summer and GTECH says more are in the works.

As mediocre as Brad Penny has been on the mound this season, the Sox pitcher was even worse on stage the other night. The heavyset hurler showed up at the Key Club in LA Monday and sang a little ditty with good buddy Chuck Liddell and the boys in the glam-metal band Steel Panther. Penny and Liddell, the mixed martial-arts mauler known as "The Iceman," howled a bit of Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'." (Penny and Liddell previously partied together in Cabo with porn star Jayden James.) A snippet of the singalong is posted on TMZ.com.

Keith Lockhart spent his morning yesterday warming up with cellist Maya Beiser and jazz band leader John Pizzarelli, both of whom played with the Boston Pops last night. (They play again tonight.) Beiser, who played on film soundtracks for "The Happening," "The Great Debaters," and "Blood Diamond," and Pizzarelli, who hosts the syndicated "Radio Deluxe With John Pizzarelli," are part of a Pops program that includes an interpretation of the Dropkick Murphys' "I'm Shipping Up to Boston."

On any given day, there's a good chance that Milton actor Tom Kemp is on television. Having played parts on "Law & Order," "NCIS," and "Without a Trace" - and in movies such as "Gone Baby Gone," "W," and "Mystic River" - he's almost always on TV, thanks to repeats and movie channels. Few know his name, but Kemp's face always looks familiar. "I'm often playing priests and cops," Kemp (inset) told us yesterday. "Character actors - they're the meat and potatoes." Kemp's latest gig has him filming in his hometown. After joining the cast of "The Company Men" - the John Wells project that has had Ben Affleck, Tommy Lee Jones, and Kevin Costner popping up all over the city - Kemp spent Monday at the Milton Cemetery filming a funeral scene with the aforementioned actors and "Company Men" costars Maria Bello and Maryann Plunkett. Kemp's been cast as a white-collar guy who, with Affleck's character, gets laid off from a corporate job. Kemp's already shot scenes with Affleck in Natick and will be filming more over the next two weeks. "It's the first time in my many, many years in Milton that I walked to work." Kemp used to spend much of his time in New York and Los Angeles, but because so many films are now made here, he's been able to stay home. He was even in "The Departed," although you didn't get to see him. Kemp played Leonardo DiCaprio's character's father in the Oscar-winning film, but his one scene was scrapped during editing. "It actually originally opened the movie. It was a flashback," Kemp said, adding that when he ran into Martin Scorsese at the Coolidge Corner Theatre after "The Departed" was released, the director profusely apologized for cutting the scene. "He made up for it by casting me in his next movie," which, of course, is the locally-shot Dennis Lehane adaptation "Shutter Island."

New Kids on the Block fans south of the Mason-Dixon line got some bad news yesterday. The Boston boys announced that because of "unforeseen production delays," they'd be canceling tour dates in Birmingham, Ala., Tampa and West Palm Beach, Fla., and Raleigh and Charlotte, N.C. (refunds are available). Floridians shouldn't complain too much - they have the chance to get up close and personal with the boys very soon. Tomorrow night - before NKOTB hits the waters for a weekend cruise with fans - New Kid Danny Wood will have his 40th birthday party at Liv Nightclub in Miami Beach. General admission tickets are $40, but if you're a high roller, you can spend $15,000 (yes, three zeros), for a VIP table that comes with rights to deliver Wood his birthday cake. Deliver it, not jump out of it. The money raised will go to the Susan G. Komen for the Cure.