Animalympics/Trivia


 * Executive Meddling: The film was cut into small parts to be aired on NBC during the 1980 Winter Olympics and the 1980 Summer Olympics. Well, they managed to do the Winter Olympics just fine -- but then the US boycotted the Olympics and Moscow, and the producers got screwed.
 * Hey It's That Guy: If you look at the opening credits, you'll find a Mister Brad Bird as one of the animators.
 * Actually, this was Steven Lisberger's first major project, and he used it to raise money to pitch for a certain film called Tron. You know the backlighting effects in Animalympics? They were the basis for the visual effects in Tron.
 * Many of those who worked on Animalympics would also work on Tron.
 * You'll also see a lot of current Pixar employees here, too.
 * Hey It's That Voice: Harry Shearer as Keen Hacksaw, in the voice he would later use for Kent Brockman of The Simpsons.
 * In addition (among many parodies of then current sports announcers and celebrities) Billy Crystal did his Howard Cosell and Gilda Radner did her Barbara Walters (i.e. her Baba Wawa from SNL.)
 * Keep Circulating the Tapes: There have been a few small VHS releases, but the movie's only DVD release so far was in Germany. Fans had either better take very good care of their VHS tapes, or yoink a video-service version before the companies do.
 * it should be noted that the german dvd has english as a language option and comes with a little booklet containing the song lyrics in both german and english for anyone who might want to sing along.
 * The same thing goes for the soundtrack, which only ever had a rather limited vinyl release. You can find most of the songs on it on YouTube--but again, for how long?
 * Talking to Himself: Most of the boxing segment is Rugs Turkell (Howard Cosell as a turkey) interviewing Joey Gongalong (Muhammad Ali as a kangaroo). Billy Crystal does both of them.