Succeeding by Glorious Excess

By Richard Zoglin

They called him "the Great One," a nickname that was as grandly excessive as the man himself. Jackie Gleason, who died last week of cancer at 71, was a big drinker, a big spender and a big fellow (his weight at one time topped 280). * Exuberant and gregarious, he addressed nearly everyone he met as "pal." During the 1950s and '60s, he was one of the most popular and highest-paid stars on TV, yet his talent extended to Broadway (a Tony Award for the 1959 musical Take Me Along), movies (The Hustler, Soldier in the Rain) and pop- music composing and conducting. "If I didn't have an enormous ego," he once said, "how in hell could I be a performer?"

But even Gleason's celebrated ego was overshadowed by his most famous creation: Ralph Kramden, the blustering but softhearted bus driver whose marital squabbles and get-rich-quick schemes were chronicled in one of TV's most beloved sitcoms, The Honeymooners. The show -- a recurring sketch on Gleason's variety program that was spun off into a series for one season -- was the ideal showcase for Gleason's superb comic timing, Oliver Hardy-like physical grace and sheer vaudevillian gusto ("To the moon, Alice!").

Born in Brooklyn, the son of an insurance auditor who disappeared when he was eight, Gleason dropped out of high school and began working as an emcee at carnivals and nightclubs. He moved to Hollywood, where the movie roles were unmemorable, but in 1949 found a home in the new medium of television. After one season as star of The Life of Riley, he became host of a string of variety shows that lasted for roughly two decades. In addition to The Honeymooners, they featured such characters as the rich playboy Reggie Van Gleason and Joe the Bartender. In 1964 Gleason moved his show to Miami, where he built a house on the edge of his favorite golf course and burnished his reputation for high living. The man who used to exclaim "How sweet it is!" seemed to enjoy life to the end. "Almost everything I wanted to do, I've been able to do," he said in 1985. "And most of it turned out pretty good." Better than that, pal.