Shia Back on Right Side of the Law

LaBeouf signs on to star in big-screen adaptation of John Grisham's latest novel, The Associate

By Gina Serpe Dec 02, 2008 4:31 PMTags
Shia LaBeoufFlynetpictures.com

For his next big-screen project, Shia LaBeouf is sticking with what he knows—or at least, what he has come to know via a few high-profile, rather embarrassing incidents—the legal system.

In a nice change of pace, this time around the actor will be the one in the right, signing on to star in the latest cash cow adaptation of a John Grisham novel, The Associate.

According to Variety, LaBeouf will play a fresh graduate of Yale Law School who is manipulated into accepting a job at a prestigious law firm and who soon becomes privy to inside information about a billion-dollar lawsuit.

In other words, every Grisham book ever written.

Paramount Pictures acquired the book rights even before it was published, so sure studio suits are of its box-office prowess. The crime thriller won't be published until January.

There's no word yet on when the film will go into production.

In other casting news, Courtney B. Vance and Pirates of the Caribbean romantic foil Jack Davenport have become the first actors to join ABC's drama pilot Flash Forward.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, the show is being touted as a companion piece to Lost and is based on Robert J. Sawyer's sci-fi novel that chronicles what happens when everyone in the world simultaneously blacks out for 2 minutes and 17 seconds and experiences a strange vision of the future.