‘Glee’ season 5 spoilers: See Darren Criss, ‘Downton Abbey’s’ Shirley MacLaine

There are a lot of stories out there related to “Glee” today. We’ll start by at least addressing the fact that TMZ published a report saying that Lea Michele and Naya Rivera are trading barbs over whether or not there was an incident on-set Thursday. It’s basically the same “Lea’s a diva” stuff that we’ve heard time and time again, and while there may be fire given all the smoke that has been out there with this story over the years, there’s not much we’re going to do on this until we see something official.

Moving on to something a little more positive: The arrival of Shirley MacLaine! The photos here are from the episode airing a week from Tuesday entitled “The Back-Up Plan,” which just so happens to be the first episode to feature the “Downton Abbey” guest star. Her role here is of a wealthy socialite who Kurt and Blaine both perform in front of, but surprisingly, she takes more of an interest in Blaine and wants to help him become a star.

To us, the best thing about this story is that it gives Darren Criss something to do beyond play an insecure guy who is having trouble being in New York City around someone who is feeling very good about himself right now. This is just the dose of confidence he really needed. But, the show’s going to have to give us a whole lot more information beyond just “let’s make him a star,” since that pretty much means nothing since Kim Kardashian can be a star.

Given that there has been no discussion of MacLaine returning to Downton for the show’s upcoming fifth season, there are no limits at the moment to how much she could appear here.

Want to get some more TV updates worth singing about now? Then sign up for our CarterMatt Newsletter today!

Photo: Fox