The Shark is Broken (2021) - How the cast of Jaws swapped Amity for hostility

Credit: allocine.fr

A couple of years ago, Ian Shaw, son of the late Robert Shaw, came across a drinking diary his father had kept. He found it authentic, moving, brave of his father to be so honest about his struggle with addiction. At the time, he had grown a moustache for a role: a look in the mirror made him realise how alike he and his father were. Shaw penned a shadow, an idea of a play and left it in a drawer, returning to it at a later date with collaborator Joseph Nixon when some friends suggested he do something with it. What eventually emerged was The Shark is Broken, a three-man show centred around the behind-the-scenes of Steven Spielberg’s 1975 Jaws, in which Robert Shaw starred as the twinkling-eyed, fearless fisherman Quint.

Jaws’ production was turbulent to say the least: various prop malfunctions (most notably the three mechanical sharks, for which the play is named), bad weather, and going over budget all contributed to the tension on set, but it is the stormy relationship between the three leads, aggravated by the amount of free time they had on their hands, that has garnered the most widespread attention to this day. The Shark is Broken plays with and uses this to its advantage, getting up close and personal with the drama, offered up on a holed-up prop of the Orca, the centre of the film’s action.

It is clear from the start that Shaw is the star of the show, appearing last on stage, his arrival as tentatively awaited as the very shark that caused his father and his co-stars so much grief almost fifty years ago. His performance is remarkable, both as Shaw senior, the alcoholic with his quick wit and cutting remarks, but also as Quint, the gravel-voiced fisherman recounting the night the USS Indianapolis sunk. The script cleverly layers generation upon generation, Shaw senior speculating as to whether his father, who killed himself when he was a child, would be proud of him. No doubt Shaw junior, perfectly embodying his father, is also asking himself, and his audience, the same question.

This is not to say however that Demetri Goritsas and Liam Murray Scott, who play Roy Scheider and Richard Dreyfuss respectively, are not as remarkable. Dreyfuss is on edge, a rush of emotions from his first moment on stage, tapping his foot and filling the silences Scheider tries to establish. He is young and excitable, yet already driven insane by his fear of failure and insecurities as an actor. Scott captures frenzy and arrogance admirably, and a scene in which he has a cocaine-induced panic attack highlights his skill just as much as it does Goritsas’, who portrays the mediator Scheider with sensitivity and intelligence. Scheider appears more accepting of the production’s difficulties than his co-stars – who pace back and forth hissing condescending remarks at each other – resorting to either taming them or reading the newspaper and discussing the possibility of Nixon being the worst president of the US in history. The play is in fact filled with this type of retrospective humour, in which the actors of the past foreshadow their future and ridicule what has become our present: Spielberg’s directing future (“what next, dinosaurs?”), or the ludicrous possibility of a Jaws sequel, which Scheider passionately declares he will never be in (he did in fact return for Jaws 2 in 1978). It’s easy comedy, but entertaining all the same. What has the most impact however are scenes of increasing tension between Shaw and Dreyfuss, varying in importance, from the odd, overly competitive card game to a heated discussion on Dreyfuss’ worth and future as an actor. Though fists are raised and feelings wounded, there is also a sense of understanding, if ever so slight, the same fears and doubts of starring in a film everyone suspects will flop, of being forgotten as an actor, as a person. This is no doubt why the scenes in which the three alternate positions on the boat – looking out at sea, reading the newspaper, staring into space in the cabin – to symbolise the passing of time are both so moving and revealing of the difficulties suffered on set. What The Shark is Broken tells us in the end is that there is no need for a shark: for Shaw, Scheider and Dreyfuss, there was enough fear, tension, vulnerability and camaraderie to share around on the ocean for days.