For as charismatic and beloved as he was as a late-night talk show host, Johnny Carson was famously prickly off-camera. There are lots of stories about him being difficult to work with, and once he retired from his gig at “The Tonight Show,” he more or less completely withdrew from the public eye (save an appearance here and there on “Letterman”). So it should come as little surprise that when a documentarian tried to contact him about participating in a film about his life, Johnny wanted no part of it. From Deadline:

The doc’s writer-producer-director Peter Jones confirmed that he had been pursuing Carson in letters from the time he famously retired from Tonight in 1992 to participate in a doc on his life, but he never received so much as a response. “Then one day in 2002 I got a call and heard, ‘Johnny Carson’s on Line 2,’ and I thought it was a joke. But it was really Johnny. He said to me, ‘Peter, you write a very good letter. I know you want me to participate in this, but I won’t be doing anything about my life because you know what? I don’t give a sh-t. … I’ve done everything I want to do and said everything I want to say. There is nothing more.’ And that was that.”

I don’t know why, but I love this story. The idea that this guy had been trying to contact Carson for 10 years (TEN YEARS) without so much as a peep from Johnny, and then Carson called him up one day and was like “Yeah, nice letters. Scram”… it’s just such a ridiculously over the top a-hole move that I have to respect him for it. The man was a walking “Deal With It” GIF.

Until yesterday afternoon, I had never heard of Casey Anthony. Honest. My information intake is carefully crafted to give me every scrap of news from the TV industry, some sports news, Twitter’s trending topics, the front page of the New York Post, and more dog and cat pictures than you can possibly imagine. If it’s serious news, I won’t learn about it unless it becomes a meme.

…which, as you can here, it has. Again, I’m barely versed in the Anthony trial — I haven’t even backtracked through the case like Darnell Dockett has – but I know enough to understand that Michael C. Hall’s Dexter hunts down killers who escape the justice system. I’m not sure how much Showtime wants to do the “ripped from the headlines” thing that “Law & Order” did so well, but I suspect it would make for a very short season of “Dexter.”

Bonus Casey Anthony TV news: Below, Jay Leno’s monologue joke comparing the Anthony jury to Obama’s economic team is met with stony silence from the crowd (fast forward to 1:15). Mmmm, that’s good schadenfreude.

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Yesterday, Lindsay Lohan taped a “surprise” interview with Jay Leno that will air on this evening’s “Tonight Show.” You can watch the preview clip below, but it’s not worth the time you’ll waste sitting through the preview commercial.

In case you’ve been buried in a cave without wi-fi for the last six years or so, Lindsay has spent her entire adult life snorting cocaine, drinking excessively, smoking cigarettes, not wearing underwear, chasing a lesbian lover, and dodging jail time despite several arrests and convictions for DUI and drug possession. In this clip she seems apologetic for those mistakes, stressing “I’m not a kid anymore. I’m 24.” And it’s funny that she mentions that, because that’s the same age I was when I led a tank platoon over the Kuwait border into Iraq. In other words: go to hell, Lindsay Lohan.

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We didn’t get around to covering NBC’s cancellation of “The Paul Reiser Show” after just two episodes on Friday, because I was traveling and Danger Guerrero rightly covered stories about stabbings and sexual assault instead. But the unfunny turd did indeed get flushed, according to The Hollywood Reporter:

The comedy premiered to 3.3 million viewers and a 1.1 rating in the adults 18-49 demographic, ranking as the network’s lowest-rated in-season comedy bow ever. Its second episode didn’t fare any better, collecting 2.5 million viewers and a 0.9 in the demo.

If my memory serves, that’s the fastest cancellation since “Lone Star” last fall. Mmmmm… that’s good schadenfreude. Full-bodied and robust, with chocolaty hints of gloating. Delicious.

For those who already miss the presence of Reiser on television — and the numbers say there aren’t many — he’s booked as one of Jay Leno’s guests tonight (Reiser famously wrote about what a nice guy Leno is during NBC’s late-night fiasco with Conan O’Brien). It puts Reiser in the unusual position of being scheduled to promote a canceled show. Oh well, instead of a plug I guess we’ll just have to settle for the naturally hilarious comedic banter between Jay Leno and Paul Reiser. It’s must-watch TV, assuming you only have three channels and the other two are showing snuff films and Holocaust footage.

The Tonight Show (NBC) — Viral sensation Rebecca Black makes her first late-night appearance as Leno’s second guest this evening. There’s nothing else on tonight that I could possibly want to watch less than this, and yet I feel compelled to lead with it. I blame Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday. (Watch a BRVTAL METAL cover of “Friday” below.)

Marcel’s Quantum Kitchen (Syfy) Series premiere. Having already pissed off anyone who cares about cooking shows, former “Top Chef” contestant Marcel Vigneron will attempt to appeal to geeks instead.

Best in Film: The Greatest Movies of Our Time (ABC) — Hosts Tom Bergeron and Cynthia McFadden walk the viewer through 15 different categories of movie greatness (Greatest Line, Most Romantic Screen Couple) as determined by American voters. I expect it to be like an episode of “America’s Funniest Videos” but with fewer sound effects.

Traffic Light (Fox) — I haven’t checked in on this promising but uneven comedy since its premiere; I plan to give it another shot tonight.

Big Brian: The Fortune Seller (truTV) — Series premiere. It’s “Antiques Roadshow” for people with head injuries.

LATE NIGHT GUESTS: Eric Stonestreet and Sarah Chalke on Conan; Katie Couric on Letterman; Duran Duran follows Black on Leno; Rainn Wilson, Abbie Cornish, and The Gaslight Anthem on Kimmel; and Brian Williams and Dwight Howard on Fallon. Full listings at TV Squad.

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