from Lowell Sun
Sullivan leaving ‘BZ to battle cancer
By David Perry
Millions of radio listeners across New England and beyond will have to find someone else to go to bed with.
Paul Sullivan has left his weeknight 8-midnight shift at WBZ Newsradio 1030.
Sullivan, 50, says he is leaving his radio job to continue his battle against the cancer that has resulted in four surgeries and depleted his energy.
Sullivan, a longtime Sun columnist and political observer who joined WBZ as a nighttime regular in 1999, was diagnosed with stage IV melanoma in November 2004.
He told The Sun yesterday he wants to relieve his wife, Mary-Jo, and their children of some of the “burden” of his care, and “be fair to WBZ” in allowing the station to move on in finding a full-time replacement.
“Their work depends on ratings and putting the best team on the field,” he said. “And I am not able to be a member of that roster right now.”
Sullivan underwent a fourth surgery May 4 in Boston, and his slot has been filled by guest hosts.
WBZ was to announce Sullivan’s departure officially this morning. In a letter to his colleagues, he said the toll of the surgeries “makes it unlikely that I will ever have the energy to return to a daily talk-radio program.”
The letter also says he is plotting “one last regular show on WBZ next week to get a chance to comment on the world that has been uncommented on by me during this last seven weeks.”
“After reviewing everything, it’s clear that being a late-night talk-show host and battling cancer are not two tasks that go well together,” said Sullivan, sitting in a Sun conference room yesterday afternoon.
He stressed that nothing about his condition or diagnosis has changed, and he continues to battle “an incurable but treatable disease. I compare it to having diabetes.”
“There is a point, and this is no bull,” he said, “when the demands you put on everyone around you become difficult to justify. My wife has spent the last 21/2 years caring for me. It’s just about all she’s thought about.”
Sullivan sounded like a local guy on WBZ’s nighttime slot, with a quick wit and an acuity that included everything from an insider’s political knowledge to a deep appreciation for the Three Stooges. At its peak, Sullivan’s show reached 38 states and what he has called “the smart part of Canada.”
Sullivan, who lives in Salisbury, began his radio career at WLLH-AM in Lowell in 1989 with no previous professional radio experience.
“My first experience was when they turned the microphone on my first day,” he said.
He subbed for David Brudnoy at WBZ before getting a regular 10-to-midnight slot in 1999. Brudnoy, on the night before he died of Merkel cell carcinoma in December 2003, told WBZ executives he wanted Sullivan to be his replacement.
It wasn’t easy. The previous month, Sullivan suffered stroke-like symptoms driving to The Sun and was rushed to the hospital. Doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital removed a brain tumor, and Sullivan began his own battle with cancer.
But despite periodic interruptions for treatment, Sullivan’s discussions on politics, current events and pop culture earned him Best Talk Show honors from the Associated Press in March 2006. Last February, his writing in The Sun earned Sullivan a first-place award in the Humor Column category of the New England Press Association awards.
He said he’s been mulling leaving radio full-time since his most recent surgery.
“I started to think, maybe this is nature’s way, or God’s way, of saying, ‘You’ve got to slow down.’ “
Sullivan has only been on the air for one segment as a guest shortly after his latest surgery, but he’d been considering a return.
Last week, during a meeting with his doctor, Sullivan asked if the work of a four-hour daily show could hinder his recovery. If it’s a good time to get out, why not take advantage of it, the doctor told him.
“It’s just time,” Sullivan said yesterday. “I don’t regret leaving at all. I regret the fact that my health is not better so I could stay, not that I’m leaving.
“And then meeting with my doctor, faced with a blunt assessment, I didn’t really question it.”
While he also will continue to weigh in as a Sun writer, his health will become his job.
He reflected on how far his everyman’s voice reached into the American night.
“Yeah, it’s a pretty powerful pulpit,” he said.
And then, a flash of the Sully wit.
“And not abusing it has been pretty difficult.”