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Star-studded set on Columbus Avenue

Seven trailers lined Columbus Avenue along Carter Playground Friday. Each was adorned with a small orange tag, some with names like “Tank” and “Jimmy D,” others labeled “Fashion” and “Terra Firma.”

Two blocks away, a film crew huddled outside the Petit Robert Bistro, located at 480 Columbus Ave. Several men sat on the stoop of a brownstone apartment building. Alec Baldwin soon emerged from the building, causing onlookers to point and stare.

Baldwin was in the city to film “Bachelor No. 2,” a romantic comedy scheduled to be released next year, said producer Greg Lessans. Baldwin, Dane Cook, Kate Hudson and Jason Biggs star in the film.

“Bachelor No. 2” tells the story of Dustin (Biggs) and Tank (Cook), “the biggest jerk in the world,” Lessans said. Dustin hires Tank to take his ex-girlfriend, played by Hudson, on a date. The date is intended to go horribly wrong, causing Alexis (Hudson) to return to Dustin.

“It’s basically about a guy who is such a jerk, who, if I were to cheat on my wife, I would hire him to take her out and show her the worst night of her life so that she would come running back to me,” said Lessans, of Terra Firma Film.

Baldwin plays Tank’s dad, a character Lessans said will, “take everything you expect [from Baldwin] and turn it on its head.”

Every frame of “Bachelor No. 2” has been filmed in Boston, at locations outside and indoors, like the Daily Catch restaurant on the waterfront and Suffolk University Law School. The crew arrived on Columbus Avenue at about 7 a.m. Friday and spent the rest of the day shooting scenes along the street, at Carter Playground and inside the Columbus Avenue apartment building.

Lessans said the Boston location gave the film “its own flavor,” something that separated it from romantic comedies shot in New York City or Los Angeles.

“It’s one of the places where you can plop yourself down in any neighborhood and look around you and there is always something interesting,” he said. “It’s got so many different looks. It’s got so many different feels.”

The filming caught the attention of many Boston students and residents. A small crowd lingered across the street from the set, taking pictures and hoping to meet the actors.

“My friend said he saw Dane Cook and Alec Baldwin, but I was in class at the time,” said Dan Robinson, a sophomore English major. “I might want to ask Kate Hudson to marry me.”

Sophomore music industry major Drew Schwartz said he came to the set after receiving a phone call from Cook, whose booking agent works with Schwartz’s uncle’s managing company. Schwartz had never met Cook.

Schwartz hoped to speak with Baldwin about the widely-publicized threatening voicemail he left his daughter this past spring.

“I’m disgusted in how he handled the whole situation. It’s just a shame,” he said. “I just want to get his take.”

The crowd had a brief opportunity to meet Baldwin when he signed autographs and even spoke with two toddlers about their favorite dinosaurs and career aspirations.

“Claudia, you are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen in Boston my whole life. Are you an actress?” he said to the toddler.

He then told her he would see her in Hollywood.

Baldwin returned to the set for more shooting with Cook, an actor and comedian who Lessans said is “so in touch with his fans” judging by his more than two million friends on Myspace. Lessans said students would enjoy Cook’s sense of humor in the movie and his ability to be “at times very R-rated.”

“I also think college kids really respond to honest comedy and by that I mean comedy that’s a little bit like life and life can be a little edgy,” he said. “Life can be a little R-rated.”

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