"I'm not much of a scorekeeper, but Sony was very pleased when I hit two million views," reports Penn Jillette, speaking of his Crackle.com and YouTube.com "Penn Says" Internet bites. "They sent me a basket of candy."

In a month during which Ringo Starr and William Shatner took to YouTube to vent (Starr about fan mail and Shatner about George Takei's supposed animosity toward him) — a month in which filmmaker Wayne Wang released his "The Princess of Nebraska" movie on YouTube and drew more than 165,000 viewers — Penn's delighted to be in the medium's mix.

The 6-foot-7 half of Penn & Teller notes, "I first did e-mail in 1984, when about the only one you could send e-mail to was Steve Jobs. Everyone said, 'The phone is better. You can talk to people.' I'd say, 'Yes, but there's something different about e-mail.' It took 25 years to really be able to articulate it."

Now, doing his Internet moments — as opposed to his ongoing stage shows, his Showtime "Bull*@!" show or other TV, including a forthcoming guesting on "Numb3rs" — "feels very, very different. I know people will only be watching it when they feel like clicking on it and hearing something I want to say." And as far as being spontaneous, "I've only done four with more than one take, and that's been because of something major like dropping the camera."

Jillette notes that he was present at a recent new media conference in Las Vegas, where it was noted that "10 hours of new YouTube material is being put up every 10 minutes. It's fabulous."

Among his favorite aspects of the phenomenon is the unearthing of such gems as heretofore unknown film footage of legendary piano man Art Tatum performing. "For years, everyone who knew jazz, piano and bebop knew there was only one Art Tatum clip of two minutes, and that was all," says Penn. "But the people who had made home movies weren't in touch with the intellectuals … Now there are 45 minutes of clips."

THE BIG SCREEN SCENE: Music diva Mariah Carey became the laughingstock of the acting world when she starred in the box-office bomb "Glitter" — but her performance as a battered wife in the forthcoming "Tennessee" won kudos at the Tribeca Film Festival. Her costar Lance Reddick is eager for the movie to be sprung on the public Dec. 19. "I think people are going to be very surprised. I thought she was wonderful. She was really, really serious about the work. I saw the film for the second time recently, and I was able to see a lot of the subtlety of her performance," extols the actor, who plays her controlling husband in the flick about two brothers who drive from New Mexico to Tennessee in search of their estranged father.

"There's no comparison," he adds of her previous acting experiences. And, referring to the filmmaker behind "Monster's Ball" and "The Woodsman," Reddick adds, "The other thing to remember is that this is a Lee Daniels film. He's a very serious filmmaker, and every film he does he tackles very important social issues."

Carey's reportedly already lined up for a second feature for Daniels — "Push," about a Harlem social worker — and has a Yuletide movie musical in development for herself.

MAN OF SCIENCE AND FAITH: "The Big Bang Theory" costar Simon Helberg has been set to join the cast of Joel and Ethan Cohen's "A Serious Man" — in a role that's mighty far from his "Big Bang" socially inept genius character, Howard Wolowitz. Helberg lets us know he'll play a junior rabbi that another character finds disconcertingly young when he comes to seek spiritual and marital guidance. "I'm shooting that next month during our show hiatus," reports the actor. He also says, "I auditioned for this part about a year ago. It took nine months for me to find out I got the part. They were working on other things — they weren't just thinking about me," he adds with a laugh.

Meanwhile, Helberg's thrilled with "Big Bang's" burgeoning popularity at home and in some 20 countries around the world. He's heard it's doing well in lands from India to Israel to Italy. "It's strange to me. We're so insulated we don't feel it unless we travel. Living in Los Angeles especially, people here are numb to celebrity."

TEEN TO SCREEN: With "High School Musical 3" on the big screen, can we now expect more Disney Channel movies to spawn features — like, say, "Camp Rock 2" starring the Jonas Bros. and Demi Lovato? Disney production chieftain Oren Aviv isn't ruling out anything. "We're always thinking about how we can use great creative ideas," he says.

With reports by Emily Feimster.

To find out more about Marilyn Beck and Stacy Jenel Smith and read their past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2008 MARILYN BECK AND STACY JENEL SMITH

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