Two Fish: One Fresh, One Battered

Sydney Morning Herald

Saturday October 21, 2000

RUTH RITCHIE

The future is just starting to sizzle for Australia's favourite champion of the swimming pool ... but the chips are down for a former champion.

Monday night presented viewers with a strange juxtaposition of swim stories and another opportunity to reflect on Olympic fame and glory. What should we call it? Rich Fish, Poor Fish? A Tale of Two Togs?

Two Australian over-arm swimmers made the news on dry land. Neither were really news stories, but they were both about swimming and fame, so I tuned in.

A Current Affair (Nine) painted the portrait of a failed Channel Seven personality, Neil Brooks, the Brookster, Brooksy Baby. His swimming ability and bad boy charm propelled him into a career of sportscasting, earned him millions and ultimately sent him bankrupt. He confessed to never feeling more alone than he did when he was rolling in bucks and piss, and bad moments at the Logies with Sam Newman. Gee, all those years and kilometres of gazing at the bottom of the pool, they weren't lonely, not compared with the loneliness of a crowded pub. Poor Brooksy.

He doesn't exactly seem reformed, bless him. And unless he drinks the profits at his wife's new Perth restaurant, he's certain he'll be back, bigger and richer than ever before. He's still a likable lad, with a big booming laugh and that happy round face. Underneath the chub, it is just possible to recognise the boy who stood on the dais with a gold medal, a lifetime ago. So young, so proud, so like Ian Thorpe on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno on his 18th birthday (Foxtel, Monday).

That's not exactly true. The Ian Thorpe ``accidentally" plucked from the audience of the late night chat show with a microphone already strapped to his left hip was neither dripping wet nor nave. With more than a touch of the Ricky Martins, wearing the largest knitwear Mr Armani makes, he beamed at the live audience and the cameras. Hands on hips, a giant towering above the townsfolk, he introduced Drew Carey with a special confidence that comes with drinking and swimming in the magical waters of Milperra.

Bummer, Brooksy. Times have changed. There was no co-hosting Jay Leno in Brooksy's day. If you wanted to get noticed by the media you had to give crass interviews to men's magazines, or spill your guts on A Current Affair.

Thorpe handled himself very well on American television. He didn't have to do much. He managed to look gorgeous, smile, and lounge with the endearing gangly posture of a teenage boy who wants to lie on the floor and isn't allowed. He was never exactly interviewed, and for most of the show he only had one shoulder in shot, but I stayed up and watched in case he said or did anything, that wonderful boy of ours.

We never worry about him talking to Roy and H.G. or Denton. That's like doing the school play, but Leno, well, that's more like a starring role at the eisteddfod.

What a roller coaster these athletes are on. Years training for it, minutes doing it, then months or is it years letting us stare at them while they talk about it. I hope I never see Thorpey on A Current Affair.

And for all of those athletes who are enjoying their moment right now, not just talking about it, the Paralympics 2000 Opening Ceremony (ABC, Wednesday) was a night to remember. Good party. Good concert. Pity about the weather, but Olympic Park could have been flooded and spirits would not have been dampened.

There is something about the sight of Stadium Australia, full to chockers, with people waving little torches, and even though you can't see their faces, you just know they are all grinning.

It's not a sports arena. It's a great big gooey pit of good will and positive energy.

George Negus was knowledgeable but restrained in his commentary. Every time he threw to the men in the field, Tony Squires and Triple J's Merrick and Rosso, they had very little to contribute, but Jeeze, they were happy.

Our team was jumping out of their skins with excitement. Some of them made the perpetually ``stoked" Justin Norris look demure.

Representatives of disabled athletes can probably stop telling us not to dwell on personal tragedies but focus on the fact that these are elite athletes, competing against the best in the world. By Wednesday night we'd got the idea. In chairs, on crutches, walking on their hands, the sense of joy and achievement was no different from last month's Olympics opening ceremony.

That's it, you know. We'll have to bung on one of these every month to keep our morale up. Kylie is going to be exhausted. Vanessa will be hoarse. Manufacturers of hot air fish puppets will be jubilant.

And what about the concert? Well, it was about time Vanessa Amorosi wheeled out Shine. Where was that a month ago? Same goes for Taxiride's We're On Our Way. The lesson here is that songwriters should not be employed to write rousing pop anthems about striving sporty stuff, when perfectly good ones already exist. We know the words, so we can sing and cry.

For true lump-in-throat value, nothing compares with that guide dog holding an Australian flag in its mouth. I hope I never see that dog on A Current Affair.