U.S. OLYMPIC FESTIVAL LOS ANGELES 1991 : Sync or Swim, Full of Laughs : Synchronized Swimming Joke Is on the Joker This Time

Harry Shearer, then a member of NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” cast, nearly popped a neck vein the first time he saw synchronized swimming in the 1984 Summer Olympics.

Disbelief doesn’t do justice to his emotions. Amazement? Outrage? Yes, outrage, that’s more like it.

Flickering across his television screen were images of young women bobbing in and out of the water in some sort of aqua-ballet. As he watched, Shearer was overcome by a sense of indignation. He knew nothing about the sport, except that he instantly hated it. To him, it was like watching Esther Williams reruns, but with an Olympic twist.

“I got absolutely teed off at the idea that these women wearing lipstick in the swimming pool were getting the same gold medals as other people were getting for what I considered real athletic achievement,” Shearer said. “My unremitting sense was, ‘This isn’t right. If these are worth gold medals, why isn’t marathon waiting at the supermarket worth the same?’ ”

Knowing a good idea when he saw one, Shearer hurried to his VCR and began recording the competition, which was making its inaugural appearance as an Olympic medal sport. About a month later, when the Saturday Night Live cast assembled in New York for a new season, Shearer unveiled his newest skit story line:

Two earnest brothers, slightly losers, passionately embrace synchronized swimming and dedicate themselves to Olympic greatness. Using the same up-close-and-personal profile style employed by the network’s sports division, Saturday Night Live details the struggle these two “athletes” endure in their quest for aquatic glory.

The idea wasn’t an easy sell. Worried that the Olympics would be a faint memory by the time the program was shown, several with the show expressed their doubts. Shearer persisted and before long, he and Martin Short had a working script, as well as a convert, Christopher Guest, who would play the swimmers’ “special” choreographer-coach.

The intent was simple enough: mock synchronized swimming. If a former accountant (played by Shearer) and his dimwitted brother Lawrence (Short) could dream of cracking the Olympic lineup, how tough a sport could it be?

With straight faces, they mimicked parts of the routines done by synchronized swimming stars Tracie Ruiz and Candy Costie, then the reigning U.S. champions and 1984 gold medal winners in the duet competition. So true was Shearer to the sport that he and Short used the same music Ruiz and Costie used in their Olympic performances.

But unlike actual swimmers, Short, who wore a swim cap and a life vest, and Short retired to the shallow end of the pool and synchronized away. Truth be told, they weren’t half bad.

That was seven years ago, and much to Shearer’s dismay, synchronized swimming is a veteran of two Olympics and preparing for a third in Barcelona next summer. In the meantime, the sport’s best swimmers assembled in Los Angeles for the Olympic Festival.

Even more surprising to Shearer is that U.S. Synchronized Swimming, the official federation, has made him, Short and Guest the poster children of sorts for the sport. The skit, recently included on SNL’s 15th anniversary special, has become a cult classic among synchronized swimmers and officials. U.S. Synchronized Swimming executive director Betty Watanabe is trying to land Short as a spokesman.

“Short would be more of a contemporary version of Esther Williams for us,” she said.

Watanabe also wanted ESPN to cover the sport at the Olympic Festival, but the cable network has declined. If Watanabe could have gotten Short to attend the competition and, better yet, gotten him to jump into the pool, ESPN promised to be there.

Short’s agent said the actor was unavailable because of movie commitments.

No problem, Watanabe said.

“Do you think Shearer would be interested?” she asked.

Shearer is too stunned to be interested. Told that his work earned the praise of the very people he meant to ridicule, Shearer could hardly suppress a laugh.

“My original idea was, ‘This should never be in the Olympics again,’ ” Shearer said.

Paula Oyer, the former director of U.S. Synchronized Swimming, decided the sport needed to take advantage of any publicity it could get, mocking or otherwise. During a banquet in late 1984, Oyer stepped to the microphone and told the assembled U.S. Synchronized Swimming athletes and officials that the all-powerful International Olympic Committee had just voted to include another event into the Summer Games.

“We’ve been working very closely behind the scenes,” she said. “We’ve also been working closely with NBC, and we’d like to show you a sampling of the new event.”

With that, the lights dimmed and on came the Shearer skit. Imagine the surprise of synchronized swimmers seeing Shearer and Short fluttering away in the water like waterlogged geeks. Never mind that men aren’t eligible to compete in synchronized swimming . . . what about some of the skit’s dialogue?

Shearer’s character: “Officially, (synchronized swimming’s) gotten zero acceptance.”

Short’s character: “I don’t swim.”

Shearer: “And Lawrence doesn’t swim. So as you know, of course not, nobody’s going to just walk up to us and hand us a gold medal, especially since men’s synchro isn’t even in the ’88 Olympics--yet.”

Short: “But that’s OK, because we could use the time. I’m not that (slightly stuttering) strong of a swimmer.”

Shearer: “But that just means in ‘92, we’re a lock for the gold.”

And later. . . .

Shearer: “I remember, it was a Friday and my wife, Valerie, asked, ‘Honey, is there something wrong?’ And I said, ‘No, there’s nothing wrong. I’ve made a decision. I’m leaving the accounting firm, and Lawrence and I are going to pursue a dream that we have, that basically synchronized swimming is going to be our lives for the rest of this century.”

The banquet screening was met with mixed reaction.

“Some people laughed, some didn’t,” Oyer said.

Oyer said she thought it was a scream. Still does. She was especially impressed with the attention to detail. Shearer and Short had their hair plastered back with some sort of mousse or gel, just like the real synchro swimmers. Even the routine drew rave reviews from Oyer, who wasn’t aware that Shearer and Short spent a solid week perfecting the choreographed hand and head movements.

“They were right on the mark,” she said.

Oyer, who serves as executive director of U.S. Rowing, tried to turn the SNL skit into a synchronized swimming bonanza. Her goal was to turn the attention into an appearance for Ruiz and Costie on David Letterman’s “Late Night” show. The more publicity, she figured, the better. It never panned out.

In 1985, Watanabe replaced Oyer. By then, the sport had moved from Olympic infancy to adolescence. Faced with a new set of marketing challenges, Watanabe searched for a way to draw continued attention to synchronized swimming. Once again, Shearer’s skit came to the rescue.

“We like that kind of notoriety,” she said. “We can turn it into a real positive for us.”

Volleyball has actor Tom Selleck as its pitchman. Richard Dean Anderson, TV’s MacGyver, is a goodwill ambassador for hockey. Watanabe wants celebrity status for her sport, too, and she’ll take Short and Shearer.

There also are personal reasons involved. Watanabe, much like the characters played by Short and Shearer, can’t swim a stroke.

“I can relate to them,” she said.

Synchronized swimming still has its share of image difficulties. There remain lingering questions about what exactly synchronized swimmers do in the water. Is it sport or underwater interpretive dance?

“The perception was that it was artistic, and there are Olympic fans that don’t think artistic sports belong in the Games,” Oyer said. “When I went to the (1984 Olympic) trials to see for the first time, I was impressed. It really requires a lot of athletic skill and endurance. No one can say it doesn’t take a lot of athletic skill.”

This is true. Even Shearer admitted that the sport requires a certain specialized talent. As for Olympic merit, he remains unconvinced.

“I know (synchronized swimming) is grueling,” he said. “But a lot of things are grueling that don’t belong in the Olympics. Cross-country bicycle races . . . sack races. It’s grueling to mine coal, more so probably. But it’s not in the Olympics.”

Shearer partly blamed television for the birth of synchronized swimming. His theory is this: TV programmers are so desperate for something to fill the vast Olympic air time that they’ll show anything.

“They’re probably looking for more events to include,” he said. “What’s next, championship oil changing?”

Like it or not, synchronized swimming is here to stay. America’s pastime, it isn’t. Then again, it’s a tad harder to do than Short and Shearer would have people believe. A glance at the routine done by the nation’s reigning star, Kristen Babb-Sprague, would prove that much.

Of course, Babb-Sprague wasn’t without her detractors. Her husband, Ed Sprague, who plays for the Toronto Blue Jays, used to tell people that he thought synchronized swimming was something people did in the movie, “Caddyshack.” Remember the scene? Unruly golf caddies invade the country club pool and then execute a perfectly choreographed water ballet.

But an Olympic sport? Sprague could hardly believe it.

Shearer still can’t. However, he said that U.S. Synchronized Swimming is welcome to use his skit as a marketing tool.

“If it makes them happy, that’s OK,” he said.

* NOT SO FUNNY: Some were not amused by comedian Harry Shearer’s comments. C11