Latest news with #RobertShaw
Epoch Times
12-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Epoch Times
‘Robert Shaw': Wobbly Biography of the ‘Jaws' Star
In Chapter 7 of Christopher Shaw Myers's new book, 'Robert Shaw: An Actor's Life on the Set of Jaws and Beyond,' Nelson Mandela pays a visit to an apartheid-era South African school during the mid-1950s. What does this have to do with Robert Shaw, who played Quint in the 1975 film 'Jaws'? Well, Mandela engaged in conversation with the actor's sister Joanna, who was teaching at a blacks-only school in South Africa at the time. That's the big problem with this new biography. While the title suggests an in-depth consideration of the great British actor and writer's work on the landmark film, the book is a bait and switch. It places a very heavy emphasis on Joanna Shaw, who is the author's mother, and on Doreen Shaw, the family matriarch. The making of 'Jaws' becomes a tenuous hook that holds this work together, and Robert Shaw comes across like a supporting player in what is supposed to be the story of his life and his greatest career achievement.
Geek Tyrant
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
Awesome JAWS Poster Art From Artist Tyler Stout Pays Tribute To Quint — GeekTyrant
I had to share this great Jaws print with you that was created by artist Tyler Stout. This was a limited edition Comic-Con exclusive of only 150 prints. They sold out at the event, but I managed to score one, and this is a beautiful peice! The poster was created for CODA Gallery. Quint, the rugged shark hunter from, is one of the most unforgettable characters in cinematic history. Played masterfully by Robert Shaw, Quint is the epitome of grit and resilience, an old-school seaman with a weathered exterior and a deep-rooted trauma that fuels his obsession. What makes Quint such a powerful character isn't just his fearlessness or bravado, but the depth of his past, especially the haunting USS Indianapolis monologue that reveals the true horror he's lived through. He's not just a shark hunter; he's a man shaped by survival, driven by vengeance, and unwilling to back down. His intensity, gruff charm, and unwavering determination make him a compelling force in the story and the emotional anchor of the film's tension.
National Geographic
03-07-2025
- General
- National Geographic
What everyone gets wrong about the deadliest shark attack in history
HISTORY & CULTURE SHARKFEST The sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis is widely known as a shark story—but the truth is much more horrifying. The U.S.S. Indianapolis at port in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, circa 1937. The sinking of the warship is considered one of the worst tragedies in U.S. Naval history: 879 men lost their lives while the survivors suffered for four days and five nights until they were rescued. Photograph By Navy History and Heritage Command "The shark comes to the nearest man and that man he'd start poundin' and hollerin' and screamin' and sometimes the shark go away. Sometimes he wouldn't go away." Robert Shaw's iconic monologue as shark hunter Quint in Jaws captured the horror of the day 80 years ago when sharks descended on the crew of the U.S.S. Indianapolis after the vessel was sunk by Japanese torpedoes during World War II. Thanks to the fame of the movie, that speech propelled the worst shark attack in history into public lore. (Martha's Vineyard locals reflect on the legacy of 'Jaws' 50 years later.) But his speech had some critical errors. Many retellings focus on the sharks mercilessly picking off the survivors, but the terror of that day in July 1945 was 'much more than just a shark story,' says Lynn Vincent, author of Indianapolis. It's a story of hundreds of men—some just 17 years old—who set off a great adventure and changed the face of history before experiencing unimaginable horrors, adds her co-author Sara Vladic. The sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis is considered one of the worst tragedies in U.S. Naval history. What really happened? This is the true story of the disaster of the Indianapolis. The U.S.S. Indianapolis sets sail on a top-secret mission The U.S.S. Tranquility lands in Guam carrying the survivors of the U.S.S. Indianapolis. Only 316 of the 1,195 crew members aboard the ship survived after being torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. Photograph By National Archives The U.S.S. Indianapolis was hit by torpedoes just after it had completed a top-secret mission: delivering components of the atomic bomb that the U.S. would later use on Hiroshima during World War II. Photograph By National Archives The Indianapolis—affectionately known as the Indy—was already well-known by the time she met her gruesome demise. She had 10 battle stars and was President Franklin D. Roosevelt's ship of state. In March 1945, a few months earlier, the Indianapolis had been hit by a Japanese suicide pilot, or kamikaze, in Okinawa and was sent back to California for repairs. 'The Japanese plane not only hit her, but sent a bomb through her, literally through her,' says Paridon. 'It exploded underneath her keel.' By the time she was mended, the U.S. Navy needed a ship to transport components of the atomic bomb destined for Hiroshima to Tinian, a U.S.-controlled island south of Japan. 'That's why she's available… because she had taken that hit,' says Paridon. 'It's a twist of fate, really it is.' (Wreckage of WWII-era warship U.S.S. Indianapolis found after 72 years.) The Indy was loaded up with the priceless cargo and set out on her crucial journey on July 16. The mission was 'uber, uber, uber secret,' says Paridon. 'The sailors on board that ship had no earthly [idea] what they were carrying. Capt. Charles Butler McVay had an inkling. He was told 'every day you save on your transit is one less day we're gonna have to fight this war,' says Paridon. After racing to Tinian under radio silence, the Indy delivered the bomb on July 26 and the top-secret mission was over. But her hardships were about to begin. The U.S.S. Indianapolis at New York City about a decade before it was sunk by a Japanese submarine. The maritime disaster was made famous by Captain Quint's monologue in the movie Jaws. In terms of lives lost, it was the U.S. Navy's second worst catastrophe in history, trailing only the attack on Pearl Harbor. Photograph By Naval History and Heritage Command The U.S.S. Indianapolis was leaving Guam in the early hours of July 30 when a Japanese submarine spotted the ship glinting in the moonlight. Commander Mochitsura Hashimoto ordered his crew to fire and two torpedoes struck the ship. 'These are big kabooms, to put it very, very bluntly,' says Paridon. That was the first catastrophe. Many men were 'there one minute, literally gone the next,' he says. Others were hit by shrapnel and burned by hot metal as they tried to escape. The Indy sank in just 12 minutes. Those who found themselves in the water—concussed, burned, wounded, and covered in oil from the wreckage—were about to face a nightmare lasting five nights and four days. Joseph A. Jacouemot and Richard P. Thelen, two survivors of the U.S.S. Indianpolis, are shown in a hospital in the Philippines shortly after their rescue in August 1945. Hundreds of men struggled for five days to survive dehydration, hypothermia, shark attacks, and madness while floating in the South Pacific. Photograph By National Archives Likely attracted by the commotion and bodies in the water, sharks—likely oceanic whitetips and tiger sharks—started to arrive soon after the ship sank. Stories tell of over 150 men being killed by sharks in a feeding frenzy. But even though we don't know exact figures, the event is acknowledged as the worst shark attack in history. For context, the total number of unprovoked shark bites globally in all of 2024 was just 47. It's believed the sharks largely fed on corpses and the dying. 'Did they eat some of the corpses? Absolutely. Did they bite some of the survivors? For sure,' says Seth Paridon, a historian and deputy director of the Mississippi Armed Forces Museum. 'But it wasn't to the degree that the myth makes it out to be.' (How to stay safe if you do find yourself swimming with sharks.) Some barely saw shark activity. In an oral history conducted by the Naval History and Heritage Command, senior medical officer Capt. Lewis Haynes 'saw only one shark' and didn't see anyone get bitten. McVay recalls merely 'getting a little annoyed' with the shark following his group because it was scaring away the fish that could have provided food. Spending days in the water with circling sharks was just one of countless horrors the men experienced. 'The human story is really what is missed amid all the focus on the sharks,' says Vladic, who spent a decade interviewing 107 of the surviving crew and their families. 'The survivors themselves don't appreciate the focus on the sharks, because there were a lot more men died of many more things.' The men had no food or fresh water and were exposed to the burning sun. Some died of their wounds from the explosion while others succumbed to exposure, exhaustion, thirst, violence, and even suicide. Desperately thirsty, some drank seawater, which caused salt poisoning and mass hallucinations. 'It was amazing how everyone would see the same thing,' said Haynes, who recounted in an oral history how a group of men all thought they saw a nearby island where they could get some sleep. 'Even I fought hallucinations off and on, but something always brought me back.' (Sharks aren't really mindless killers. So why are we so afraid of them?) Perhaps the most heartbreaking delusion was that the Indy was just under the surface. Some men tried to reach the galley to find food, 'and they would swim off down to their deaths,' says Vladic. A chance rescue In Jaws, Quint tells Chief Brody and Matt Hooper that the mission was 'so secret, no distress signal had been sent.' This is one of the speech's key errors. 'The mission was long over,' says Vincent. They had no more need for secrecy. The problem was that the distress signals weren't processed properly. No one was searching for survivors. Survivors of U.S.S. Indianapolis being brought ashore from U.S.S. Tranquility at Guam, on August 8, 1945. In this photograph, they are being placed in ambulances for immediate transfer to local hospitals. Photograph By PhoM1/c J.G. Mull., National Archives A landing craft takes a number of injured survivors ashore for hospitalization at Peleliu, an island in the Palau archipelago in Micronesia. The wreckage of the U.S.S. Indianapolis was discovered by chance—their distress signals hadn't been processed properly. Photograph By National Archives Lt. Wilbur Gwinn discovered them by chance during a routine air patrol on the morning of August 2. While fixing a broken antenna on his plane, he happened to look down and spot oil and flotsam in the water. At first, he thought it was an enemy submarine. Then he saw men floating in small groups and sent a message calling for help. In response, Lt. Adrian Marks was sent to help in an amphibious aircraft. Realizing that rescue ships were hours away, he performed an open sea landing—which are against naval regulations because they are so dangerous—and tried to get as many men out of the water and into the plane as possible. He even tied some onto the wings of his plane with parachute cord. Just after midnight on August 3, rescue ships arrived and the men were finally safe. Of the 1,195 men aboard the Indianapolis, 879 lost their lives. Just 316 survived. The final victim of the Indianapolis The Indy had one more victim. Despite the overwhelming support of his surviving crew, Captain McVay was court martialed by the U.S. Navy for negligence in December 1945. Naval vessels are supposed to zigzag in 'submarine-infested waters' to make it harder for torpedoes to hit them, says Paridon, but McVay hadn't done so—because, it turns out, he hadn't been told there were submarines nearby. Admiral Raymond A. Spruance, commander of the Fifth Fleet, pins a Purple Heart on Clarence E. McElroy, a survivor of the U.S.S. Indianapolis. Many of the men who survived the disaster never spoke of the trauma they experienced. Photograph By National Archives Hashimoto was even called to testify. He said that nothing McVay did, including zigzagging, would have stopped him sinking that ship, but the captain was still found guilty. The verdict wasn't overturned until 1996. 'The survivors fought for 50 years to have their captain exonerated,' says Vincent. However, McVay, who took his own life on November 6, 1968, didn't live to see his pardon. 'That's the ultimate, final tragedy,' says Paridon. The legacy of the U.S.S. Indianapolis Many survivors never spoke of their trauma. 'They rarely talked about it to anyone, including their families,' says Vladic. 'There are quite a few cases where the children of survivors found out their dad was on the ship after watching Jaws.' The movie brought the ship's story into public awareness but the Indy's real legacy isn't her sinking, or the sharks, but her role in changing the course of World War II. 'These guys accomplished their mission, and they fought together to survive,' says Paridon. Just one living survivor remains: 98-year-old Harold Bray. But, says Vladic, the crew's families are determined 'to keep the story alive long after the last survivor is gone.' Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story premieres on National Geographic starting July 10 and streams on Disney+ and Hulu starting July 11. Check local listings.
Irish Times
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
The film Jaws and its Co Mayo connection
Robert Shaw's untimely death was all the more tragic for having happened at a time when he finally looked like achieving peace of mind and financial security. Shaw was just 51 when he suffered a heart attack at the wheel of his Range Rover on August 28th, 1978. He was with his third wife Virginia Jansen and the youngest of his 10 children, Thomas, aged one. He passed a pleasant afternoon golfing and was driving from Castlebar to his home at Drimbawn House, his red brick mansion in Tourmakeady, Co Mayo. The house, on the shores of Lough Mask, was once owned by the Jameson family of whiskey fame. He bought it in 1971 as a refuge to escape the clutches of the British Inland Revenue. READ MORE Shaw had been in splendid form and thought he had heart palpitations. He got out of the car to walk it off. He had only taken a few paces when he collapsed again. A passing motorist turned around and drove back to the village to fetch the local doctor, Dr Frank Browne, but he was unable to revive the stricken actor. Shortly before he died ,Shaw gave up the drink fearing he would die as his great hero Errol Flynn had done prematurely and from alcohol-related disease. 'He had no liver left at all. I decided I didn't want to go that way at that age.' Sobriety came too late for Shaw. He drank a bottle of vodka every day before going on set for Force 10 from Navarone which finished shooting in early 1978. The script was so bad he wanted to quit acting, but needs must when you have 10 children, an expensive house to run and a sizeable tax bill. 'To fulfil my obligations I've taken roles and spoken lines that I would be ashamed to have written,' he once said. He had the starring role in his last film Avalanche Express. By the time it was released in 1979 both he and the director Mark Robson were dead. Shaw is best remembered as Quint in Jaws released on June 19th, 1975 with little fanfare and even less expectation. It is a peculiarity of that film that its leading man - Shaw was billed ahead of actor Roy Scheider who played Chief Brody - and its real star, the titular shark, hardly appear until the final half hour of the film. We first meet him Quint scraping his nails down a blackboard to attract attention to himself while the mayor and locals deliberate on whether or not there really was a man-eating shark in the waters around Amity Island (real life Martha's Vineyard). Quint is an Irish-American who had his head bashed in during a brawl on St Patrick's Day in Boston. He displays his war wound to 'college boy' shark expert Matt Hooper (played by Richard Dreyfuss) while they describe their respective war wounds from wrestling human being and man-eating fish. Quint, the rule-breaking war veteran and shark hunter, and Hooper, the privileged graduate of the Oceanographic Institute, needled each other in real life as much as they did on screen. Shaw behaved like a 'demon' on set and would frequently taunt and tease him, Dreyfuss remembered. He never knew if Shaw was being serious or just trying to get a better performance out of him, but, in any case, the dynamic worked perfectly on screen. Shaw's son Ian, the image of his father, co-wrote a play, The Shark is Broken, in which he played his father and focuses on the relationship between the three human stars of the film. It was staged at the Gaiety Theatre in May in advance of the 50th anniversary of the release of Jaws this month. The relationship between Dreyfuss and Shaw was only one of a smorgasbord of tribulations which affected the young and relatively unknown director Steven Spielberg. The mechanical shark, nicknamed Bruce, worked perfectly in a freshwater location, but in sea water, its rubber skin began to expand and distort and the mechanics short circuited. As a consequence, the shark is only in shot for four minutes in total. The film is an hour old before we get the first sighting of the shark in all its horrific magnificence causing Schieder to improvise the most famous line in the film, 'You're going to need a bigger boat'. Jaws made Shaw the leading man he always craved to be. He starred in Black Sunday (1977) and The Deep (1978) written by the author Peter Benchley who wrote the book on which the film was based. He was edging closer to the financial independence which would have allowed him to fulfil his true ambition – to become a full-time writer. Despite all the chaos in his life and his alcoholism, Shaw had written five novels in the 1960s, one, The Man in the Glass Booth, was successfully adopted for Broadway, but his film career became all-consuming. He was penning a sixth, with the working title of The Ice Floe, when he died. 'When they write my obituary, I would like them to say, 'He was an author who wrote one book that will last and he was also a remarkable actor',' he once suggested. For weeks afterwards telegrams and cars arrived at the Tourmakeady post office from around the world. Shaw was cremated in Belfast and his ashes scattered near his Irish home. A stone chair was erected in the village to mark the 30th anniversary of his death. Speaking at its unveiling, Virginia said Shaw's Mayo home was his favourite place in the world: 'He just wanted to be himself. He wanted real life. Tourmakeady gave them that. He didn't like the razzmatazz of Hollywood.'
Geek Tyrant
23-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
How Steven Spielberg's JAWS Survived a Nightmare Shoot to Redefine Hollywood Forever — GeekTyrant
Jaws is a legend, not just the film, but the way it was made. It's hard to imagine that a movie this iconic was once on the verge of collapse. But in the summer of 1974, a 27-year-old Steven Spielberg found himself in the middle of the Atlantic, shooting a shark movie that seemed like it would never be finished. 'We didn't know how they were ever going to finish this movie,' recalled actor Jeffrey Kramer. 'There were rumors all around the set that the studio was going to shut us down.' And who could blame them? Three mechanical sharks, all of which barely worked. Unpredictable weather. Seasick cast and crew. Over 100 days behind schedule. The $4 million budget ballooned to $8 million. For Spielberg, the pressure was intense. 'His nails were bitten to the stubs,' said co-writer Carl Gottlieb. 'But that was the only manifestation of his nerves. Steven knew he needed to lead by example. That meant concentrating on his job and keeping his cool even when everything around him was going to hell.' Everything did go to hell. Spielberg wanted to film on the real ocean off Martha's Vineyard to make it authentic, but it made continuity a nightmare. Boats drifted into frame. The shark sank. And the cast, especially Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss, clashed hard. 'Jaws should never have been made,' Spielberg later admitted. 'It was an impossible effort.' And yet… it was finished. And not only that.. it was a game-changer. When it hit theaters on June 20, 1975, Jaws terrified audiences and raked in $260.7 million in its initial release, becoming the highest-grossing movie ever at the time. Test audiences screamed so loud popcorn went flying. 'As soon as the studio saw that reaction, they went, 'Jesus, this is going to be a big movie,'' said production designer Joe Alves. That's when everything changed. Universal shelled out a then-massive $1.8 million for marketing and dumped the film into 400+ theaters nationwide, which was something unheard of at the time. The studio leaned on the success of Peter Benchley's novel and embraced the movie's shark logo like a brand. 'By the time we sneaked the film in Dallas, we didn't even need to name it in the ad,' said producer David Brown. 'We put in the logo of the shark's teeth and the swimming girl and 3,000 came out in a hailstorm.' The ripple effect was massive. Jaws didn't just create the summer blockbuster, it created the blueprint. Big spectacle, wide release, aggressive marketing, merchandise. Star Wars , Jurassic Park , the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe, they all exist because Jaws proved you could turn a movie into a cultural phenomenon. But the brilliance of Jaws wasn't just the marketing. Spielberg made the most of the film's limitations. When the mechanical shark broke down, he leaned into suspense, letting music, POV shots, and editing build dread. Verna Fields' editing, John Williams' now-legendary score, and Spielberg's decision to not show the shark as often made the movie scarier. 'I played boom boom boom on the piano for him,' Williams said. 'And Steven said, 'Are you serious?'… Then he said, 'Oh, this is wonderful.'' The emotional core is what truly anchors the movie. Spielberg cut subplots and honed the story down to three men against the sea. That clarity paid off. Moments like Brody's son mimicking him at the dinner table or Quint's chilling Indianapolis monologue make the terror feel human. Gottlieb remembered when Shaw finally cracked the speech: 'He came to dinner one night, slammed his hand on the table and said, 'I've got that pesky speech licked.' He read it to us. It was so stunning that when he finished, Steven said, 'That's it. We're shooting that.'' That four-minute monologue is a masterclass in character work, and it's one of the reasons Jaws still hits 50 years later. It's not just the fear of sharks, it's the fear of losing people, the fragility of control, the reality of death in the deep. Even filmmakers born decades later still look to it. 'So much of the language of cinema comes from this film,' said Eli Roth. 'Spielberg created all of it.' Jason Blum agreed: 'Even young filmmakers say, 'It's going to be like the shark in Jaws.' That's incredible for a film that's 50 years old.' Spielberg, of course, went on to break more box office records with E.T. and Jurassic Park , and earned acclaim for Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan . But Jaws was the movie that made him… and scarred him. 'You've probably noticed I haven't done very many water pictures since Jaws,' he told his biographer. Who could blame him? When you survive a nightmare and change cinema in the process, you've earned the right to stay on dry land. Via: Variety
