SHORT TAKES : Hollywood’s ‘Water Man’ Dies

SANTA MONICA — Olympic swimmer Manfred Zendar, whose work on such films as “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea” and “Jaws” earned him the nickname “Hollywood’s Water Man,” has died. He was 83.

Zendar died of heart failure Monday at St. John’s Hospital and Health Center, said his friend Ben Masselink. Zendar leaves a son, Fred Jr., and two grandchildren. There was no funeral.

“He really was the water man for Hollywood,” Masselink said. “Every time a water movie would be done, they would hire him. He was the best guy.”

As a marine adviser and certified master diver, Zendar scouted locations, operated boats, designed costumes and laid out underwater sequences for more than 50 movies.

He was also one of the first lifeguards at Santa Monica Beach.

He placed third in the breast stroke in the 1924 Olympics. He competed but failed to win a medal in the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam.

He designed the diving suits for Walt Disney’s “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea,” built a raft for the Marilyn Monroe and Robert Mitchum film “River of No Return” and created the 22-foot lift bags that raised the jet off the ocean bottom in “Airport ’77.”