Mark Wahlberg and "Entourage"

As a film actor, Mark Wahlberg is known for playing street-wise guys (as in Martin Scorsese's "The Departed") not far from his real-life beginnings as a tough on the streets of Dorchester, Massachusetts. But despite his apparent rough edges, Wahlberg is also a very smart "show runner" television producer with taste and business savvy. He owes his TV production success to his hit HBO series "Entourage."

Wahlberg's "Entourage"

Although "Entourage" was created by writer Doug Ellin, much of the show back story and characters are based Wahlberg's experiences as an up and coming young movie star in Hollywood. While he'll admit that certain "Entourage" storylines are based on his own life experiences, he refuses to own up to any particular incident or aspect. There are facts that can be deduced from what's public knowledge about Wahlberg's life.

Like Vincent Chase, the series' main character, Wahlberg came to Hollywood with some old friends from his working class neighborhood such as Donnie "Donkey" Carroll, who performed many of the same assistant functions as the series character "Turtle." With the success of "Entourage", the old friends had a falling out in 2005 because Carroll wanted compensation for the Turtle character. Later that same year, "Donkey" died of a severe asthma attack.

Also like Vince and his brother Johnny Drama, Wahlberg has a brother who broke into the entertainment business before he did. Donnie Wahlberg was a member of the popular eighties pop group "New Kids on the Block." For a short time, Mark was a member of this group, but left to form the edgier, more rap oriented group "Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch." The Drama character, however, is based on Wahlberg's cousin, bodybuilder John Alves who had a starring role in the film "Southie."

Ari Gold, "Entourage's" agent character, is based on Wahlberg's real-life agent Ari Emanuel, the brother of Obama White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.

Unlike Mark Wahlberg, it's hard to imagine the "pretty boy" Vincent Chase character as a street tough. Wahlberg was one of nine children. As a teenager, he got into fights and rolled drunks. One of these fights cost a middle-aged Vietnamese man an eye and wound up sending Wahlberg to the state penitentiary for 45 days. It was this experience that transformed Wahlberg's life, turning him into a devoutly religious Roman Catholic to this day.

"Entourage" was originally conceived as a hand-held video camera reality series that followed Mark Wahlberg around in real-life. When Wahlberg and his manager/partner Stephen Levinson decided to make it a comedy-drama, they brought in writer Doug Ellin, who wrote at least 50 drafts of the show pilot.

Wahlberg the "Show Runner"

Wahlberg and Levinson are also executive producers of a second successful HBO series, "In Treatment" starring Gabriel Byrne. The starkly dramatic one-on-one series takes place in a psychiatrist office and couldn't be farther from the sex, drugs, and rock and roll Hollywood existence of Vincent Chase and his entourage.

In 2008, HBO bought two new series from Wahlberg and Levinson, one is in partnership with Martin Scorsese. "Boardwalk Empire" is a drama set in the criminal underworld of Atlantic City in the 1920s.

Mark Wahlberg also has a charitable side. In 2001, he established the Mark Wahlberg Youth Foundation, a fundraising organization for disadvantaged youth services such as the Boys and Girls Clubs.