The viability of Sullivan’s Big Tent philosophy faded toward the end of his career. His “everyone’s invited” formula, the variety show producer as curator of national culture – combining old, young, black, white, Jewish, gentile – was supplanted by a niche approach, a strategy of creating television shows (or magazines, or most anything) to appeal to narrow demographics, like young affluent suburbanites, or urban blacks in the 18-34 age group. Whether this is good or bad is an open question, though it certainly separates us into distinct, mutually exclusive camps.
Yet while his Big Tent ethos fell into disrepute, one of the concepts he was an original embodiment of would not only live on, but perhaps be the central legacy of the small screen: the television producer as image maker.
He was a supreme imagist. As television is the home of the manufactured world, Sullivan proved to be one of the most talented wizards of this odd alchemy. He knew how to create the special brand of living room magic known as TV, how to produce a really big show, how to weave an hour of fantasy and escape. Using his signature formula, his combination of high and low, he created the bright and shiny bauble known as The Ed Sullivan Show, entrancing a weekly audience for more than two decades. He changed the elements as the national mood changed, but his image of the well-wrapped package of All-American entertainment would spin on, week after week, year after year.
His own image would be the most manufactured of all. Within the confines of the television screen he appeared as a wooden but sincere emcee, everyone’s Uncle Ed, a believer in the Boy Scouts and the American Way, who probably went home to a big wood-paneled den after the show to spend time with the youngsters, as he called anyone under age 35. In the late 1950s he published a book called Christmas with Ed Sullivan, a collection of reminisces by his “friends” – from Walter Cronkite to Lucy and Desi Arnez – suggesting he lived in a world of big warm holidays where everyone gathered ‘round the hearth. In reality he was a loner and a driven careerist who was typically too busy to bother with a Christmas tree until 9 P.M. Christmas Eve. In his view, family life was greatly overrated, as were close personal friendships, and he took precious little time for either. He had elbowed his way into television based on the power of his gossip column, which could be surprisingly salacious, and he was every bit as profane as the column’s yellowest tidbit – possessing a sailor’s salty vocabulary, a volcano’s sense of decorum, a pugilist’s belief in diplomacy. These qualities, however, were kept far offstage (most of the time). And since he presented himself as Uncle Ed on television, so he was seen in the public’s eye. He carved his own image with as much skill as he built every Sunday’s show.