Serena Williams' fans show passion, emotion, loyalty
There’s fandom, and there’s how comedian Sandra Bernhard feels about Serena Williams.
“It’s visceral, it’s emotional,” Bernhard says. “She’s an American dream. To see a woman like Serena — with the strength, the grace, the beauty, the power — just keep battling through ... it’s something that’s important and essential for our culture.”
Racism, sexism and other topics come up, too, and that’s just in the first five minutes talking to Bernhard about her favorite athlete.
Williams, 33, can evoke that kind of fervor in her fans. It owes to her on-court longevity and excellence and perhaps also to protectiveness given her detractors, plentiful and sometimes vitriolic in their comments on the Web.
By far the most popular female tennis player on social media, Williams has more than 5 million followers on Twitter and 1.8 million on Instagram. She also has a legion of celebrity fans, including J.K. Rowling, Kerry Washington, Drake, Kim Kardashian West, Michelle Obama and Kobe Bryant.
Bernhard, 60, has watched Williams from the start, through each of her 21 Grand Slam singles titles, and likens the experience to watching “your own child.” She marvels at Williams’ power, conditioning, angles and returns.
“It’s an elegant game, it’s a beautiful game, it’s a powerhouse game,” Bernhard says. “I can’t blink when I’m watching her.”
Like many fans, Bernhard is superstitious and has assorted coping mechanisms during Williams’ matches. She might turn her belongings in a certain direction, utter incantations or crouch in specific positions to enable energy flow.
“I’m cuckoo crazy,” Bernhard says.
Diano Eko gets it. The 34-year-old Indonesian was intent on watching his hero in person when Williams won the 2009 Australian Open. He used a year’s savings to fund the trip, and when his boss didn’t let him take enough time off, Eko quit.
“It was all worth it,” says Eko, who at the time was an account manager for a global ad agency. “Serena ended up winning the title. She and Venus won the doubles title. It’s one of the best decisions I ever made.”
And it paved the way for Eko’s new career as a tennis analyst. When he wrote about his experience on Facebook, a TV producer saw it and invited him to audition for Indonesian sports channel MNC Sports.
Eko has worked as a TV commentator for six years and also does work for Fox Sports Indonesia. He has been on air for many Williams matches. Yes, he sometimes gets emotional, especially during Grand Slam tournament wins.
“My voice will be a bit shaky, and I’ll tend to be poetic about everything,” Eko says. “But I haven’t received any complaints from viewers for being biased, so I guess I’ve been doing something right.”
Eko, too, roots for Williams partly for reasons apart from serves and ground strokes. It began when he watched news footage of her infamous 2001 Indian Wells final. “I watched a local 19-year-old player being booed by a hostile crowd, in front of her family, and still manage to win not only the match but the situation. It was amazing,” Eko says.
Die-hard fan Tony Carmody, a 28-year-old Wisconsin-based IT professional, is drawn to Williams’ confidence and desire to improve. “I love Serena the athlete. I could watch her practice serve for hours,” he says. “It’s like Peyton Manning throwing a football or Michael Jordan dunking a basketball. It’s just one of those greatest ever shots in all of sports that is amazing to see in person.”
Her fans love her for all manner of things and show it in numerous ways. Glance at the TennisForum.com threads, “You know you’re a Serena fan” and “When (and why) did U become a Serena fan?” to get a sample.
Eko notes that a subset of Williams fans “go crazy on social media,” adding they’re more extreme than “even Maria Sharapova fans and hard-core Ana Ivanovic fans.” He suspects some are trying to be protective because of all they feel she has endured.
“The ‘Rena Army’ is much like Serena herself,” Carmody says. “In the past Serena has discussed her compartmentalized yet very different personalities, and in the Serena fan base, like all sports fan bases, you’ll find your fair share of Summers, Megans and of course Laquandas.”
Summer, Megan and Laquanda are Williams’ multiple personas that she has discussed in the past. (As for Laquanda, “You cross her, then she snaps. ... She’s nuts,” Serena once said.)
The calendar-year Grand Slam would mean a great deal to her fans. Only three women have won all four majors in a single year: Maureen Connolly Brinker, Margaret Court and Steffi Graf. Court holds the record with 24 major championships.
“I want Serena to win 25 Grand Slams,” Bernhard says. “I think she can go past Margaret Court and take it to a level no one has taken it to.”
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