This image was lost some time after publication.

Because it's Friday afternoon, and more importantly, because Brett Ratner's "protection" check just cleared, we're happy to pass along this unsubstantiated report of an unconfirmed catfight between Lindsay Lohan and Jessica Simpson at the Dime last night, an act of starlet-on-starlet near-violence incited over—get ready for it—Ratner's attention. Says our tipster:

At around 1:30 they said it was the "last call" so we took that as our cue to get outta there but then none other than Jessica Simpson and her little posse came in through a back door so we decided to stay. Jessica immediately went over to that hack director Brett Ratner's table. Then outta nowhere Lindsay Lohan herself appeared and cozied right up next to Ratner. That blond guy that's always with Jessica couldn't have pulled Jessica away from the table faster. Looked like a catfight was gonna go down between the two girls but instead the blond guy called one of Lindsay's guy friends an "asshole" and the guys got into a heated argument themselves. A little later Ratner was sitting at Jessica's table just hanging out and laughing a lot but across the room Lohan was totally flipping out. Her pals kept coming over trying to pull Ratner away from Jessica's table. Then we heard a girl at Jessica's table call Lohan a "bitch"and next thing you know Ratner's like holding Lindsay back to keep her from storming the table in some all out attack. It coulda been a scene right out of "Mean Girls"!! But we weren't sure if it was the fight between the two guys that started it or if there's also something going on between Lindsay and Jessica.

Perhaps the only thing that could make the above story any stranger would the Olsen twins suddenly showing up and offering to engage each other in a best-of-three-falls hot-oil wrestling match to help settle the dispute. But maybe what The Dime's patrons were witnessing was merely Ratner's Yoda-like instruction of young Lohan, in which he staged the confrontation to force the actress to confront her greatest fear: that she could be out-skanked for a director's affection.