UPDATE: The working title "1952" has been scrapped in favor of space age Disneyism, "Tomorrowland" – and a release date has fianally  been announced. "Tomorrowland" will hit domestic theaters on December 19, 2014.

George Clooney is loving the alien.

The "Descendants" star is set to work with Disney for the first time ever (how is that possible?) as he's signed on for the studio's top secret sci-fi project, "1952," according to Heat Vision.

"1952" is simply a working title and plot details are shrouded in secrecy, though the film is said to be in the vein of Steven Spielberg's 1977 genre classic, "Close Encounters of the Third Kind." Clooney is certainly no stranger to character-driven science fiction, having starred in Steven Soderbergh's lovely take on "Solaris" and recently wrapped Alfonso Cuaron's "Gravity."

The film is set to be directed by Brad Bird, one of Pixar's go-to directors before he proved he could call the shots on a live-action movie just fine with last winter's "Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol."

News of Clooney being cast in one of its upcoming tentpole films closes what was quite the week for Disney, as the studio also announced "Little Miss Sunshine" and "Toy Story 3" writer Michael Arndt as the screenwriter for "Star Wars: Episode VII."

George Clooney will next be seen in "Gravity," which opens sometime in 2013, and is currently in pre-production on his latest directorial effort, "The Monuments Men."

Originally published on Nov. 9, 2012 at 10:57 p.m. ET.