Mark your calendars

• Although these are always subject to change, two dates have been announced for made-in-Pittsburgh movies. Kevin Smith's "Zack & Miri Make a Porno" is scheduled to arrive in theaters Oct. 31 and "The Road," an adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel starring Viggo Mortensen and still shooting here, Nov. 26.

Those come courtesy of a new schedule from the Weinstein Co. and Dimension Films. It's a good bet that some of the dates on the list of 15 films will change and then change again.

• The party will be in California wine country but the menu will have a distinctively Pittsburgh flavor: Iron City beer, Isaly's chipped ham, Jenny Lee Bakery rolls, Heinz condiments, Betsy Ann Chocolates and gourmet popcorn from Popcorn-N-That. A few Terrible Towels will be in evidence, too.

The occasion will be the premiere of Carl Kurlander's "My Tale of Two Cities" at the Sonoma Valley Film Festival on April 11 and 12. The party, casual as the menu might indicate, will follow the 3 p.m. screening April 11.

It's scheduled from 5 to 8 p.m. at Steiner's Tavern, 465 1st Street West on the Sonoma Plaza. To RSVP, contact Cait Murray at 412-622-1325 or e-mail mytaleoftwocities@gmail.com.

She is also the contact for buying a limited number of reserved $10 tickets for the April 11 and 12 showings, both at 3 p.m. Deadline for that is April 4. Individual movie tickets will also be available on a first come-first served basis at the box office door.

The movie tells twin stories. One is about Kurlander, the screenwriter-TV producer who moves his wife and their young daughter to Pittsburgh, while the other is about the once-great city that cured polio and made steel trying to reinvent itself.

It's filled with lots of familiar faces, from the late Mayor O'Connor and David Newell to Teresa Heinz Kerry and Franco Harris.

As reported Feb. 29, the festival also will honor Pittsburgh native, actor and now director Michael Keaton. For information on the festival, go to www.sonomafilmfest.org.

And if you, like me, will not be jetting to California, plans are under way to show the movie Nov. 28 at the Byham Theater. More on that closer to the event.

Talk about your product placement. And it's the best kind, a freebie.

On page 18 of Laura Lippman's new novel, "Another Thing to Fall," private investigator Tess Monaghan belatedly realizes that she rowed right into the middle of a TV shoot. After ending up in the water, she finally sees what was there all along.

"Farther up the fort's grassy slopes, she could see large white trailers and vans, some of them with blue writing that she could just make out: HADDAD'S RENTALS. ..." That would be the Pittsburgh-based business that rents trailers, trucks and other equipment for productions in Pittsburgh and far beyond.

A book review is scheduled to appear in Sunday's paper. As for me, I enjoyed this fast-paced, knowledgeable story about a television shoot in Baltimore that is plagued by accidents that grow deadlier and more disruptive.

I've read other books by Lippman, a former reporter at the Baltimore Sun, but didn't realize she had a solid connection to the entertainment business. You'll find it in an author's note at the end and it explains how she writes with such knowing detail.

My colleague Barry Paris and I have been podcasting for a couple of months. We sit down in the PG studio every Wednesday afternoon and talk about that week's selection of movies and other related news. Our podcast is called "Rated PG" for Post-Gazette but we keep the language PG clean, too.

If you go to this page www.post-gazette.com/multimedia/ and look to the left, you will find a link to podcasts. This week, in 14 minutes, we talk about "21," "Stop-Loss," "Run, Fat Boy Run," "Married Life," "The Counterfeiters" and a few of the movies in the Jewish-Israeli Film Festival.

You'll find archives at the link, in case you want to play catch up.

Variety reports that Oliver Stone has cast James Cromwell and Ellen Burstyn as former President Bush and his wife, Barbara, for his drama about the current president starring Josh Brolin as "W." That's what the movie is now being called.

Elizabeth Banks, fresh off her turn here shooting "Zack & Miri," will play Laura Bush. The trade publication's website says the movie could come out by election day in November or before the president leaves office in January.