On August 9, the world lost Kevin Sullivan. While casual fans may not remember him as well for never having a WWE run and not being as featured on screen in WCW by the time the Monday Night War heated up, he was nonetheless a deceptively important figure. His influence as a performer and his contributions to creative were hugely important in their time and had a ripple effect that has been felt to this day. Indeed The Taskmaster may well have been one of the greatest wrestling minds to have ever lived.
Kevin Sullivan Was An Ahead Of His Time On-Screen Character
Kevin Sullivan first carved out a spot in the consciousness of wrestling fans en masse wrestling in Florida, where his Prince of Darkness persona captured by he imagination of
fans and made him a heel who transcended the his regional territory to grab attention
in national wrestling publications and lead to his work with WCW.
Sullivan’s work as a cultish figure was so memorable that it led a number of fans
to actually think he’d had something to do with the death of his ex-wife and
family in 2007. More importantly, Sullivan was among a small cohort of
wrestlers working more overtly sinister, borderline supernatural characters
that paved the way for characters like The Undertaker and, down the road, Bray
Wyatt to break the mold of wrestler as athlete or cartoonish character to
inspire real fear in fans and offbeat storylines.
In the shorter term, a toned version of Sullivan’s personal also became central
to WCW programming during Hulk Hogan’s initial babyface years in WCW. Rebranded
as The Taskmaster, he became a player-coach type leading the polarizing Dungeon
of Doom faction.
Kevin Sullivan Knew How To Book Heat
To have heard Dusty Rhodes tell the tale, when he took over booking for WCW, one of his first orders of business was to get Kevin Sullivan on his payroll. The premise was simple: Sullivan knew how to book heat.
The art of getting fans truly invested in hating the heels is deceptively tricky, and Sullivan was deservedly well respected in this very specific domain. He was a complement to Rhodes in this way, and he continued to be a valuable contributor as things got rolling in the days of the New World Order. While Eric Bischoff typically gets credit for masterminding (and ultimately fumbling) the nWo concept, Sullivan’s influence is easy to detect in some of the faction’s earlier brutal beat downs of the babyfaces and other dastardly deeds.
Kevin Sullivan Navigated Tricky Waters Booking WCW
As a booker behind the scenes, one of the items Kevin Sullivan didn’t get enough credit for is doing his job amidst competing political factors and considerations. WCW was notorious for having to kowtow to the whims of a larger bureaucratic management structure, not to mention having a revolving door of leadership.
More specifically Sullivan was in charge of creative when Hulk Hogan signed on, with his infamous creative control and political stroke. It’s well documented that, when fans were lukewarm on The Hulkster, Sullivan pushed for a heel turn long before the nWo storyline started up and Hogan was ready. On top of that, Sullivan had to find something to do with an influx of talents Hogan wanted with him in WCW, or whom WCW opted to hire to recreate the feel of 1980s WWE. While a lot of fans had maligned the often hokey Dungeon of Doom concept, Sullivan capably explained late in life that his idea was to get as many of the associated talents on one segment to still free up TV time for the rest of the roster.
Sullivan also booked his way through one of the diciest situations imaginable as he wrote his own feud with Chris Benoit, which included Benoit taking Sullivan’s real life wife, Woman, from him in a wild situation of life ultimately imitating art, given she actually did ultimately leave Sullivan for Benoit. Sullivan was also a key figure when Brian Pillman’s Loose Cannon gimmick took off, including a memorable worked shoot moment in which Pillman called him “booker man” mid-match.
Kevin Sullivan’s contributions on screen and, all the more so, behind the scenes made him a hugely important figure in wrestling history. It’s very sad to see him go at the age of 75, but he won’t soon be forgotten.
