Paramount has sued 28-year-old experimental filmmaker Chris Moukarbel for using excerpts from the screenplay of Oliver Stone's upcoming World Trade Center to create a 12-minute film, featuring Yale University student actors, and posting it on his website, the Washington Post reported today (Wednesday). The lawsuit says in part, "Large numbers of people will see the Moukarbel Film first for free and determine, based on this poor-quality copy, that they do not want to pay to see the remainder of the WTC Film at a theater when it is released." The film has since been yanked from Moukarbel's website and replaced with the notice: "VIDEO REMOVED AT REQUEST OF PARAMOUNT PICTURES." Paramount has also sent warning notices to other websites that had linked to the film. The website Filmthreat.com replaced the link with a copy of the Paramount notice. It also posted a comment from one person who had seen the Moukarbel film, saying that it looked more impressive than the trailer for Stone's film.

Sony delivered its first high-definition video discs in the Blu-ray format to retailers Tuesday -- 15,000 units each of seven titles, including Hitch, 50 First Dates, Underworld: Evolution, and The Terminator. The only problem is that no players are available yet on which to play them, and it's unclear what the retailers will do with the discs before the players are available. DVD-oriented websites that have been able to preview the new discs reported that the technical quality of several of the films is disappointing (they praised the quality of 50 First Dates, however) and questioned whether a market for them could be created given the initial high cost of the players. Samsung has indicated it plans to be the first to introduce a Blu-ray player next week for $999, while Toshiba has already begun selling its rival -- and incompatible -- HD DVD players for half that amount.

The photo of a memo purportedly sent by South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker to the MPAA ratings board to get their South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut passed with an R rating in 1999 was posted on several websites Tuesday. (Among the points listed in the memo: "We put a new storyboard in for clarification in the scene with Sadaam (sic) Hussein's penis. The intent now is that you never see Sadaam's real penis, he in fact is using dildos both times." Also: "We left in the scene with Cartman's mom and the horse as per our conversation. This is the one joke we really want to fight for." Stone's "P.S.": "This is my favorite memo ever." South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut received an Academy Award nomination for Best Song, for "Blame Canada."

The FBI kept close track of the political activities of playwright Arthur Miller, and at the time of his marriage to Marilyn Monroe in 1956, an agent filed a report noting that the New York Daily News had received a telephone call from an "unidentified male" stating that Miller was a member of the Communist Party "and was their cultural front man" and that Monroe "had drifted into the Communist Party orbit." The memo was reported Tuesday by the Associated Press and was one of many received by the wire service through the Freedom of Information Act. Miller died last year at age 89. In his memoirs, he had maintained that he had never become a member of the Communist Party, although he was admittedly close to many writers and performers who did. The memos indicated that the FBI scoured Miller's plays looking for Communist propaganda, concluding finally that although they were "occasionally supported by the Communist Party" they did "not follow Marxist ideology." One of Miller's plays, The Crucible, about the Salem witch hunts (produced as a film in 1996), was said to have been inspired by the post-war Congressional investigation into "un-American activities" in Hollywood.

A merchant in phony documents in Shanghai has been bombarded with thousands of phone calls since the release of Mission: Impossible III, in which Tom Cruise is seen running past a white wall on which the phone number is written, the Los Angeles Times reported today (Wednesday). The owner told the newspaper that he had received little business from the callers. Most, he said, "just chuckle and don't say anything and then hang up." The Times noted that the movie's release in China was delayed after censors objected to several unflattering scenes of Shanghai in it, but that surprisingly, the phone number, above the Chinese characters meaning "Make fake documents," was left untouched. Such businesses, the Times observed, which produce fake licenses, certificates and IDs "are as ubiquitous in Shanghai as laundry hanging outside apartment windows."

Dan Rather vowed Tuesday that he would not go quietly into the night, as CBS forced him out of its Black Rock doors after 44 years. "My departure before the term of my contract represents CBS's final acknowledgement, after a protracted struggle, that they had not lived up to their obligation to allow me to do substantive work there." He indicated that he would not accept the fate that CBS had previously proposed for his predecessor, Walter Cronkite, and 60 Minutes creator Don Hewitt. "As for their offers of a future with only an office but no assignments, it just isn't in me to sit around doing nothing. So I will do the work I love elsewhere, and I look forward to sharing details about that soon," he said. Although CBS News President Sean McManus had earlier released a statement praising Rather as one of the network's greatest newsmen (along with Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow), reaction to Rather's departure was decidedly sympathetic to the veteran anchor and highly critical of the network that had ousted him. "Many of us believe he long ago earned the right -- through hard work, long hours and risk to his own life -- for his tenure at the network he loved so passionately -- to come to a better end than this," wrote NBC anchor Brian Williams on his blog, the Daily Nightly. "I'm very sad about the whole thing," Jim Lehrer of PBS's NewsHour told the Associated Press. "He deserved a lot better than this." Several observers mentioned the so-called Memogate scandal, which Rather barely survived after the network aired a report about President Bush's National Guard service that featured highly critical memos about the president that the network was unable to substantiate. 60 Minutes commentator Andy Rooney told USA Today that most people at CBS thought Rather should have resigned at the time. "On the other hand, I feel vaguely bad for him; it's a sad way for him to end his career." Commented New Yorker media writer Ken Auletta in an interview with Reuters: "You never expect someone who's been the face of the network for so long to just be given an office which is essentially a closet ... and then not to be given air time and then to have it leaked to the press that he's being booted." But McManus defended the handling of Rather's departure, telling the Los Angeles Times: "There's nothing disrespectful whatsoever in that we've tried to do this in a very fair and equitable way, knowing that we couldn't come to an agreement on a contract extension. It was an ongoing process that from our perspective was as cordial, lengthy and respectful as we could have made it." In reporting the story, the Times cited sources familiar with the internal thinking at CBS as saying that "CBS executives knew their decision would spark criticism but concluded in recent months that enduring the reproach was necessary to end the network's 44-year relationship with Rather."

The big ratings winner last week was the NBA Finals, whose audience soared 12 percent from last year. Not only did ABC's coverage of Sunday's Game 5 between the Miami Heat and the Dallas Mavericks tie for first place (with CBS's CSI: Miami), the next two positions on the ratings list were taken by Tuesday's and Thursday's games. Nevertheless, CBS finished on top overall, with an average 5.6 rating and a 10 share. ABC followed with a 4.5/8. Fox took third place with a 3.9/7, edging out NBC with a 3.4/6.

The top ten shows of the week according to Nielsen Research: 1. CSI: Miami, CBS, 9.1/15; 1. NBA Finals (Sunday) 9.1/17; 3. NBA Finals (Tuesday), ABC, 8.0/14; 4. NBA Finals (Thursday), ABC, 7.8/14; 5. CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, CBS, 7.7/13; 5. Without a Trace, CBS, 7.7/13; 7. Law and Order: SVU, NBC, 6.8/11; 8. So You Think Can Dance (Wednesday), Fox, 6.6/12; 8. Two and a Half Men, CBS, 6.6/11; 10. CBS Sunday Movie: What Women Want, CBS, 6.4/11.

A group of investors headed by Mexican broadcaster Televisa and Venezuelan broadcaster Venevision seeking to acquire Spanish-language network Univision is likely to face a challenge from other networks if its bid is accepted, published reports observed today (Wednesday). The reports noted that private-equity firms that are a part of the group are also part of a consortium called Valcon, which holds a majority stake in Dutch media giant VNU, the parent company of Nielsen Research, the principal ratings company. Today's (Wednesday) New York Post quoted sources close to the Univision sale as saying that rival bidders tipped off network executives to the potential conflict in the past few days. However, the principal rival, a group headed by onetime media mogul Haim Saban, includes Thomas H. Lee Partners, which is also part of the Valcon consortium. Meanwhile, today's New York Times reported that the Univision auction "was sent into disarray" when Televisa failed to submit a bid by Tuesday's deadline. (Univision, it noted, could waive the deadline.)

More people have downloaded Connie Chung's off-key version of "Thanks for the Memories," which she performed last Saturday on the final edition of Weekends with Maury & Connie, than ever watched her show with husband Maury Povich, the Associated Press reported today (Wednesday). According to the wire service, as of Tuesday afternoon, more than 413,000 people had accessed the video of Chung's performance, posted on the video website YouTube.com, compared with the average 232,000 who tuned in to her show.

Top of the Pops, one of the longest-running shows in British television history, will end its run after 42 years on July 30, the BBC announced Tuesday. With the show now attracting an audience of fewer than one million, "the time has come to bring the show to its natural conclusion," said the BBC's director of television Jana Bennett. During its lifetime, TOTP had featured virtually every major British musical group, and many American ones as well. Its first show, which aired on Jan. 1 1964, included a performance by The Rolling Stones, singing "I Wanna Be Your Man." At its peak in the 1970s, it attracted 19 million viewers each week, but in recent years it has fallen victim to MTV and the Internet. Jimmy Savile, the original host, told the BBC Tuesday, "In those days you would have to wait until Thursday night to get your [pop music] fix, and you don't need to do that anymore."