Kevin Sullivan dead at 74

News broke on Friday morning that “The Taskmaster” Kevin Sullivan had died. He was 74.

Long-time Florida wrestling personality Barry Rose confirmed the death of his long-time friend: “With the heaviest of hearts, we are devastated to have to report the passing of the legendary Kevin Sullivan. May he RIP and his family, friends and fans find comfort in how much he was loved.”

In early July, the family had revealed that Sullivan had been in grave danger:

The GoFundMe request for financial aid, set up by his daughter, Nicole, noted that on May 12, 2024, while at a Florida autograph signing, that “Kevin suffered a devastating accident. He underwent emergency surgery that saved his leg and life but faced severe complications, including sepsis and encephalitis. This unforeseen catastrophe has placed an immense financial burden on his family, as Kevin has been in and out of consciousness in the ICU, far from home. Despite these challenges, Kevin has shown incredible resilience. Months later, he is still fighting to regain his independence.”

Friends, colleagues and fans rallied around Sullivan and the campaign quickly reached far beyond it’s goal.

Over the last few days, a number of “Thank you Kevin” and “Get well Kevin” videos and posts were created for Sullivan to see.

Ric Flair wrote on X: “Kevin Sullivan Has Been One Of My Closest Friends In The Business. His Knowledge Of All Sports, Not Just Wrestling, Is Unparalleled. He Is One Of The Most Brilliant Minds In The History Of Our Business. Kevin Led WCW To A Year And A Half Victory Over WWE, And Dealt With So Many Personalities Like Hall, Nash, The NWO, Eric Bischoff, The Nature Boy Ric Flair, And Hulk Hogan! Stay Strong Kevin!!!! We Need You”

Kevin Francis Sullivan was born on October 26, 1949, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. At age eight, he rheumatic fever. “I was in bed for a year, I didn’t walk for a year. I actually started in my basement, I found a set of weights. We lived in a four decker and I found a set of weights and that’s how I started working out.”

His wrestling school was really the television, and each Saturday, he’d take over the family’s TV in their Cambridge tenement. Soon, he wrestling around the northeast and into Quebec, having not really “officially” trained. He did spend some time in Boston learning from Ed May and Paul Del Monico — hardly big names. Sullivan proved to be a sponge, though, and soaked up knowledge wherever he went.

Heading to Florida in 1972, after 13 months in Tennessee, proved to be the jumpstart his career needed, and he studied under the learning tree of promoter Eddie Graham.

“Eddie Graham used to say it takes five years to understand what you’re doing. For me, it was about five years or maybe a little earlier because I had some great teachers,” Sullivan told Alex Marvez of the Wrestling Observer. “When I first came down here, me and Mike (Graham) were partners. The other day, someone told me they remembered when me and Mike Graham won our first titles. I couldn’t even remember who we beat. I got to wrestle Bobby Shane, which was like wrestling a guy with Brian Pillman’s talent. I got to wrestle against Dory and Terry Funk. I wrestled guys who used to use me as a punching bag. There was Jack and Jerry Brisco, Danny Hodge … I was very lucky to have that opportunity.”

At only 5-foot-9, but solidly built, wrestling at around 250 pounds, Sullivan made it work against bigger opponents. Superstar Billy Graham saw that often. “He was a tremendous talent, especially for his stature. He could make people forget the difference in size, especially when wrestling [Blackjack Mulligan],” Graham (Wayne Coleman) told journalist Scott Williams in 2004. “Mulligan would have to get on his knees, and he was still bigger than Kevin, but Kevin Sullivan, he was able to carry it with guys twice his height. Very, very intense and a lot of believability, and personally, a great friend.”

He learned everywhere he went. In the WWWF of 1975-76, he was dwarfed by the bigger opponents, but size never mattered to him.

Sullivan was a master politician as well as booker.

In so many interviews, both with this website and others, he is asked to talk about other people and not himself. He had insight galore.

In his 2012 interview with SlamWrestling, he talked about former colleagues he would see at an upcoming fanfest, but little about his own life or career.

In a 2018 interview with Steven Johnson, talking about storytelling, Sullivan was able to both celebrate current wrestlers and put over the past.

“I hate to say this because the guys today are much better athletes than my generation or any generation before this. But they’re trying to write for these guys and it doesn’t work. You have to be pretty close to that character,” Sullivan told Johnson.

The greatest talkers were from his generation, said Sullivan, naming Superstar Billy Graham, Blackjack Mulligan, Dusty Rhodes, Ernie Ladd, King Curtis Iaukea. The comparisons hurt modern day storytelling. “When you watched these guys, the pressure was on you to perform and come through with a good interview. After a while you knew if the interview worked, you could draw people in. Some of those guys weren’t the greatest performers but the way they talked was so believable,” he said, launching into a King Curtis. On live TV, the television show was running a minute short, so Iaukea was tapped, and he just went out and counted from 60 to 0.

“You have to be willing to put your ego aside to tell a story. I always say about babyfaces to be a knight in shining armor, you have to slay a dragon not a salamander, meaning you have to really put the heel over and fight from the bottom much like Ricky Morton does,” added Sullivan.

In 1984, he’d portray a cult-like leader in Championship Wrestling from Florida, gaining wide fame through the gimmick. He was “The Prince of Darkness” Kevin Sullivan.”

All the devil stuff, it was very unique,” Graham told Williams. “Kevin made me laugh a lot, and he was crazy, but he performed that bit to a ‘T.’ Kevin was funny guy, a great guy. He was someone I had known for long time, and he was very funny. But he was able to really convince the people. They had that fear, that he was legit.”

Though the devil or Satan were not mentioned in the Florida interviews, it was inevitable to invoke the whole “You can’t kill the Devil” aspect in 1992 when news erroneously broke of Sullivan’s death. John Arezzi wrote about it in his Pro Wrestling Spotlight Newsletter in March 1992. Arezzi wrote:

Calls were placed to George Napolitano, other wrestlers, promoters, and reporters. No one knew anything. Finally at 5 pm I spoke to Kip Frey, who informed me that he spoke to Kevin earlier in the day. Whewww! From relief, my feelings turned to anger. Who started this rumor, and why? That night I must have received twenty-five calls, all telling me Kevin Sullivan was dead. And, there must have been a dozen different causes of his death. From a drowning, to being shot, to the drug O.D. The stories were getting more fantastic as they were coming in. I was really angry about all this, but getting more curious about how Kevin and Nancy (“Woman”) Sullivan were reacting. The following day I got Nancy on the phone. She told me that it was a madhouse at their place for the past two days. They literally got over 100 calls about Kevin’s “death.” I asked her to have Kevin call me. Later that evening my phone rang. “This is a dead man calling.” I picked up to speak to my dearly departed friend, Kevin.

Then Arezzi got Sullivan on the phone:

All this started on Friday (February 14th). I got a call from Janie at the WCW offices. She said she heard that I died in a car wreck. I assured her I was OK and that was the end of it. On Sunday Nancy and I went to get Hump (Oliver Humperdink) to go to the Ed Gantner Memorial Service. In the car Hump told me he got a call from a girl he knows in Charlotte, North Carolina who said I was shot in a bar. This gets even stranger. We stayed away from home on Sunday. Monday we got home around 5:30 pm and in our parking lot is the Chief of Police, who is a good friend of mine. He was ready to knock down my door because he heard I was dead inside the apartment. We got in the house and there were a hundred calls on the machine. Here I was at a memorial service for a friend and everyone is saying I’m dead. It’s nuts! The craziest story we heard was that Hump came to my house with two guys. There was a drug deal that went bad and I had a gun fight. I was shooting everyone, I was killed and Hump was kidnapped. What the hell could you get for ransom for Humperdink, two pairs of sweatsocks? Then we heard Nancy was locked up for conspiracy. It was mad. At least I know I got a lot of friends.

Apparently the rumor started on the Comp-U-Serve computer service, which has a wrestling insider information program. The mix-up probably resulted with confusion over Buzz Sawyer’s death, and some idiot not knowing his facts. The story is funny, in a way now. But when you hear about the death of a friend, its scary. Nancy summed it up when she said, “Remember one thing John, you can’t kill the devil.

For all Sullivan’s championships in wrestling — whether in the territories like Florida, Central States, the Northeast, Georgia, the Gulf Coast, Tennessee, or on a national scale, like in World Championship Wrestling — his influence on the business may have been greater behind the scenes.

For those who wanted to learn and listen, Sullivan was there.

At the Cauliflower Alley Club in 2015, Almighty Sheik Joe Cabibbo thanked Sullivan for talking to him for hours about booking. “You teach me so much every time you talk to me on the phone.”

“He was such a genuine human being and we became friends the second we met. I thought the world of him,” added Barry Rose.

Family-wise, Sullivan had four children from three marriages.

In his first marriage, there were two children Shannon and Ben.

His most-known union was to Nancy Toffoloni, who was a fitness model in and around Florida and began appearing as a valet. She later left Sullivan for Chris Benoit, in a case of Sullivan, as booker, essentially booking his own divorce, and she was assigned to spend time around Benoit. When Benoit killed Nancy and their son, Daniel, in 2007, Sullivan was wrongly implicated in the double murder suicide by overzealous fans.

His third marriage, to Linda Taylor, a former bodybuilder, resulted in two daughters, Nicole and Bianca. The Sullivans ran the Froggy’s Fitness gym in the Upper Florida Keys for a time.

Sullivan has been celebrated by his peers plenty, including a Men’s Wrestling Award from the Cauliflower Alley Club in 2022, the NWA Hall of Fame (2014), the New England Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame (2013), and more.

Funeral arrangements are not known at this time.

— with files from Steven Johnson

RELATED LINKS

• Kevin Sullivan story archive
• Aug. 9, 2024: Kevin Sullivan photo gallery
• Aug. 9, 2024: Colleagues remember Kevin Sullivan