As a reward for assisting DreamWorks in the daring sting operation that prevented further leaking of secrets related to the production of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of This Thing My Wife Bought At Liberace's Estate Sale, a grateful Steven Spielberg invited some members of the online press to the Universal backlot for an audience with the national treasure himself. Once there, he informed his awed guests about his ongoing debate with CGI-happy Indy partner George Lucas on their differing filmmaking philosophies. Reports /Film:

Producers are keeping details of the fourth installment of the Raiders franchise close to the vest—one extra who blabbed its secrets to a local paper was famously poisoned to death by what are suspected to have been a plate of bad dates—but even George Lucas can't help but spill a few beans when asked by an MTV News reporter about the crystal skulls that drive the movie's plot:

Apparently, IESB.net broke the news of the stolen Indy 4 items yesterday, complete with details that went unreported in LAT story we noted earlier, like that the thief was shopping around $2000 worth of the goodies to places like TMZ, and that an LAPD/FBI sting operation at the Standard nabbed the thief before any more of Lucas and Spielberg's secrets could leak out: "A meeting between the alleged thief and the unnamed online reporter was set up for 4:00pm at the Standard Hotel on Sunset Blvd. The sting went as planned and the arrest was made. The IESB has been told that the alleged thief was in possession of the stolen property." [IESB.net via The Hot Blog]

The curse plaguing Indiana Jones and the Mysteriously Bedazzled Skull has visited another hardship upon the super-secret production, as the theft of computers and photographs—they're so paranoid at DreamWorks that they won't even say where and when the heist occurred—has closely followed the tragic leaking of plot points that has left the career of one loose-lipped extra dead. And Steven Spielberg's publicist has already served notice that the studio will unleash the face-melting fury of a thousand prematurely opened Lost Arks upon any outlet looking to exploit the purloined material: "We want to warn the media that anything that is offered is stolen property. We know it is out there." UPDATE: More info here. [LAT]

Just in case the poor, overexcited extra who unwisely spilled George Lucas and Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull secrets to his hometown paper last week was clinging to any crazy hopes that all would be quickly forgiven and forgotten, one look at this image jumping from studio inbox to inbox will probably confirm his darkest fears that his Russian dancing days could be over before they really began.

With next summer's franchise blockbusters like The Dark Knight and Indiana Jones in the Land of the Diamond Skulls knee-deep into their production schedules, so are plans for the confectionery merchandising tie-ins coveted by shrill, skirt-tugging children and paunchy, middle-aged fanboys alike. Eschewing such creative but functionally infeasible options of the past—such as the boulder-sizedRaiders gobstopper that tragically killed 17 children in the summer of 1981—Lucasfilm has paired with Mars to deliver a chai-coconut Snickers that simply screams "adventure in exotic locales." Brandweek reports:

The NDA-violating actor who revealed the closely guarded plot secrets of Indiana Jones and The Swarovski-Crystal-Encrusted Skull Purse to his hometown paper may already be dead. Beware: spoilers ahead. [JoBlo.com]

The unveiling of the name of the next Indy installment—Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull—may have rendered many a whip-flinging fanboy perplexed and mildly disappointed, but let's look at the bright side: For one, we can definitively eliminate Indiana Jones and the Pink Ladies of Rydell High from the running. Also, the title's over-specificity does offer us irresponsible internet rumormongers some tantalizing clues about its top-secret plot. MTV News asked a Harvard archeology professor schooled in ancient Mesoamerican cultures to speculate on how the movie's crystal skulls might manifest themselves into thrilling Nazi chases and the exploration of crypts containing a great many creepy-crawly things:

And the official title of the project previously known as Fourth Installment of the Indiana Jones Adventures is...[drumroll, please] Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. [sound of crickets, the barely audible scratching of heads, and someone quietly muttering, "Well, they've still got time to change it. Maybe they can save face by saying they just found out it was the title of an Allan Quatermain project that was put into turnaround back in 1988."] [IndianaJones.com]

Spielberg and company have dropped another Indy 4 crumb for their starving fans through the movie's official website, but there's not much exciting in the new video dispatch; about the only interesting thing is how well Karen Allen seems to have held up. Still, we're skeptical about the image: who knows what George Lucas had his ILM people do to her? For all we know, the Marion role is going to be played by a completely computer-generated version imported frame-by-frame from the first film. [IndianaJones.com]

· These are truly exciting times over at IndianaJones.com. Not only have they treated us to the first photos of Harrison Ford in a dusty fedora taken in nearly 20 years, they've now released exclusive footage of Steven Spielberg and George Lucas drinking champagne and staring at a monitor. (Also while wearing distinctive hats!) Who knows what special surprises the coming weeks will bring cyber-savvy Indy fans?
· Things that Barbara Walters considers "beneath her": interviewing Paris Hilton once she gets out of jail. Things that Barbara Walters is OK with: reading aloud on The View a transcription of a conversation she had with Paris Hilton about finding God while she was still in jail.
· Does no one have the heart to tell Renee Zellweger that boinking a CAA agent is so Hilary Swank in the summer of 2006? It's tragic, really.

IndianaJones.com is currently boasting some big cast gets for Indy 4, the wildly anticipated summer '08 release which promises to do for arthritic archaeo-adventurers what Rocky Balboa did for steroid-abusing former heavyweight champions—i.e., show 'em that Hollywood has no problem employing the elderly if they sense there's some money to be made. Among the announced actors are Cate Blanchett, John Hurt, and Biggest Star in The World For Two Heady Weeks in April Shia LaBeouf. Sadly, however, an official statement penned by Professor Henry Jones himself, aka Sean Connery, informs us that the series' fourth installment will contain none of The Last Crusade's snappy father-son banter:

Newly minted Biggest Movie Star in the World Shia LaBeouf realizes the hard work he's got to put in to fulfill the awesome responsibility he's been handed with his high-profile role in the upcoming Fourth Installment of the Indiana Jones Situation; not only must he be sure his acting chops are honed to fine edge in order to earn his screentime with Hollywood icon* Harrison Ford, he must also transform his still-developing body to a level of beefiness comparable to that of his barrel-chested, sexagenarian co-star:

In an interview with MTV News, writer/director Frank Darabont, fresh off shooting upcoming horror flick The Mist, briefly discusses the indignities of even an A-list screenwriting life, revealing how helming a second-tier Stephen King adaptation is preferable to the powerlessness of being subject to the whims of megalomaniacal producers with total script approval:

It's a big day for Shia LaBeouf: Not only does his movie Disturbia (about a dystopic future in which dinner-spoiling telemarketers rule the world) open, but Steven Spielberg has made official the already confirmed, then denied, now super-duper reconfirmed news that the young actor will indeed be co-starring in Indy 4:

No, Transformers star Shia LaBeouf hasn't finally decided to take the radical gender reassignment steps that will permanently tranform him into the weeping 13-year-old girl he's long known to be living inside him, he's merely expressing his desire to graduate to the kinds of manly roles he knows he would be able to play if he still wasn't corporeally limited by a scrawny, post-adolescent frame. As for his supposedly confirmed role in Indy 4, the actor tells the AP, "I don't have a deal on the table, it's just a rumor," most probably a savvy, backpeddling offering to the Spielbergian gods, who expressly told his people to keep their big mouths shut until they could secure the rest of the top secret cast now common knowledge thanks to similarly loose-lipped actors.

· Lovable My Name is Earl wrong-righter Jason Lee will tackle the demanding role of perpetually put-upon, tantrum-throwing musical novelty act manager Dave Seville in a hybrid live-action/CGI Alvin and the Chipmunks feature, a project that will certainly be safe for viewing by oddly named offspring Pilot Inspektor. There is no word as to where contractually mandated co-star Giovanni Ribisi will slot into the movie, but he seems a natural for the part of Theodore. [Variety]
· Pilot casting madness! Jeffrey Tambor joins CBS comedy The Captain, Michelle Trachtenberg is in an untitled ABC comedy set in D.C., and Kal Penn will play a hypochondriac paramedic in the ABC comedy The Call. [THR]
· As mentioned yesterday, Battle of Shaker Heights immortal Shia LaBeouf is all but locked up to play Harrison Ford's son in Steven Spielberg and George Lucas' Indiana Jones 4: Please Don't Fuck This One Up By Having The Cute Kid Constantly Saving His Old Man's Ass. [Variety]
· Disney announces that Pixar's gone into production on Toy Story 3, and that their Disney Animation division will go with old-timey, hand-drawn animation for The Frog Princess. [THR]
· Today's American Idol Nielsen domination fun fact: Wednesday night's installment averaged "more than five times the rating" of competition on ABC, CBS, NBC, and The CW. [Variety]

As fans hungrily anticipate the long-awaited fourth installment of Steven Spielberg's big screen adventure series that began with 1981's Raiders of the Lost Ark (possible title: Indiana Jones and the Slowly Veering Lincoln Continental of Doom), the Internets have been teeming with casting rumors. Most notable among them: that Shia LaBeouf—who'll be fighting Soundwave and his evil boombox cassette-recorder ways this summer in Michael Bay's Transformers—would be playing Indy's son. Slate is now reporting that the rumors are true: