Most of the drama concerning the history of late-night television has been largely relegated to Jay Leno, David Letterman, and Conan O’Brien all clawing behind the scenes to host the “Tonight Show.” But, there is plenty of interesting material to explore from its quintessential former host Johnny Carson, who took the reigns from Jack Paar in 1962. A new high-profile series is in the works aiming to tackle Carson’s life.
Deadline reports that director Jay Roach (“Bombshell”) and seminal TV figure/ writer David Milch (“Deadwood”) are teaming for “King of Late Night,” a biopic series focused on the life of legendary late-night talk show host Johnny Carson. They’ve also selected Joseph Gordon-Levitt (“Super Pumped”) to play Carson in the new show that will now seek a home as it goes on the market as a package deal.
Here’s how the outlet describes “King of Late Night”:
King Of Late Night will reveal how Johnny’s diehard connection to his audience overlapped with his lifelong desire for a basic quality of life, and how his beloved on-screen persona came into conflict with the more colorful aspects of his personal life.
Carson had a darker side, including alleged domestic abuse instances and being a relatively hard drinker. One could cynically think that the creators could easily sweep the wild and notorious wild side of Carson under the rug, but all of the recent dramatic Jay Roach works (“Bombshell,” “Trumbo”), and certainly all the work of David Milch, always aim at the heart of one’s dark side.
Stand-up comedian Pat Cooper once told a story on “The Howard Stern Show” that he had a run-in with Carson in a restaurant bathroom, and the intoxicated talk show host urinated all over Cooper’s shoes instead of the urinal. When Cooper chewed out Carson, the comedian believed he was banned from “The Tonight Show” after appearing five times in the early ’70s.
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Milch has been a big-wig of one of the earlier golden ages of television and was previously behind shows such as “NYPD Blue,” “Deadwood,” and the short-lived Michael Mann racetrack series “Luck.” According to recent profiles in the New Yorker and the Hollywood Reporter, Milch He’s fallen on hard times, pissing away much of his fortune thanks to a debilitating gambling addiction. He was also diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2019, but clearly, people still believe in the 76-year-old veteran writer and perhaps hope he has one last shot at success. Roach is best known for directing the “Austin Powers” franchise before pivoting from slapstick comedy to tackling more serious material with the aforementioned “Trumbo” and “Bombshell,” and a series of politically-minded HBO movies.