Taylor a Swift Choice for CSI

Mon., Jan. 12, 2009 5:35 PM PST by Natalie Finn

Sonja Flemming/CBS; John Shearer/Getty Images

Just in case this whole Laurence Fishburne thing doesn't work out, CSI has come up with a Swift way to boost ratings.

Country-pop It girl Taylor Swift will guest star on an upcoming episode of CBS' mega-hit crime show, which bids farewell to longtime star and fan favorite William Petersen on Thursday.

Per the network, the Fearless singer will play the teenage daughter of the managers of a seedy Las Vegas motel, who is going through personal changes that ultimately have tragic consequences—a plot Taylor-made for a country song.

No airdate for Swift's episode has been announced, but in the meantime, here's more news from the world of name-brand casting:

• James Gandolfini gets to fight with a fictional wife again, this time on Broadway in God of Carnage, about two middle-class liberal couples at war with each other for various social and personal reasons. His fellow partners in domestic nonbliss will be Jeff Daniels, Marcia Gay Harden and Hope Davis. The show by playwright Yasmina Reza opens March 22 at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre.

• According to the Hollywood Reporter, NBC is looking to raise the bar on your average legal sitcom by casting Hilary Duff in the in-development comedy Barely Legal, based on a true Doogie-Howserish story about a girl who became California's youngest-ever lawyer at 18.

• TNT showed Raymond even more love by ordering up 10 episodes of Ray Romano's new midlife-crisis dramedy, Men of a Certain Age, per THR. The hourlong show stars Romano, Andre Braugher and Scott Bakula as fortysomethings who have been friends since college and are now dealing with more grownup issues.

• Kevin James is going to give his upcoming big-screen comedy Paul Blart: Mall Cop a small-screen boost by starring in a series of promotional interstitials that will air Mondays during CBS' two-hour comedy block, per Variety.

• The frequently French-speaking Kristin Scott Thomas will go back to being British in Nowhere Boy, a biopic about John Lennon's formative years, in which she'll play the Beatles icon's Aunt Mimi—sister of Lennon's beloved mother, Julia, who died when Lennon was 17.