Meet the fab three JoBros

BEVERLY HILLS - The Jonas Brothers are mugging for the camera on the balcony of a posh hotel suite. The photographer asks Kevin to shift his arm.

"Sure, but you've got to pay us first," he says.

" Say it ain't so, JoBros!

" Has the sweet-natured trio gone Hollywood-cynical already?

Breathe easy. The eldest Jonas is just channeling another upbeat band whose first fans also consisted largely of hyperventilating young girls.

"Have you seen video of The Beatles' first press conference in New York?" Kevin later asks a publicist who didn't catch the Fab Four reference as they walk down the hall to one of nearly two dozen interviews they'll give today. "A reporter asks them a question, and (John Lennon) goes, "You've got to pay us first.' It's such a great quote."

Comparing any rocking combo to The Beatles risks musical heresy. That said, these three lads from New Jersey - Kevin, 21, Joe, 19, and Nick, 16 - are hot on the Liverpudlians' manic mid-'60s pace.

The trio - which could turn into a quartet if the so-dubbed "Bonus Jonas," Frankie, 8, got shaking - sells millions of records, plays to rabid crowds, has a TV show and, on Feb. 27, unveils new movie "Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience."

And then there's the band's pop-culture ubiquity, with appearances at the Grammy Awards (where they just lost best new artist to Adele and jammed with Stevie Wonder), on "Saturday Night Live "(opposite hot host Alec Baldwin) and in the White House (first fans Malia and Sasha Obama enjoyed an acoustic serenade on move-in day).

All this, and yet just two years ago they traveled to gigs in a van.

It helps, of course, that they're traveling aboard the good ship Disney. The company has put its full weight behind the group with a vision to replicate its wildly lucrative Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana franchise.

The new Jonas Brothers movie is a page straight from the Cyrus playbook. But mixing up-tempo songs with a you-are-there feel (and a few off-stage vignettes to break up the music), the movie aims squarely for anyone with a Jonas jones who failed to get their in-person concert fix.