Creator Backlash: During interviews later in his career, Peter Benchley claimed he came to regret writing the novel when he learned about the growing worldwide fear of sharks, and he felt his book and its film version had led to massive shark overfishing that was driving several species close to extinction. He became a vocal ocean conservation activist to make up for it, and remained so until his death. His later book The Beast even features the hero ranting in his head about how much damage the film has supposedly done and Peter Benchley's Creature also takes multiple shots at the concept.
Executive Meddling: The sex scene was originally between Brody and his wife, but changed to Ellen with Hooper as the book's editor felt there wasn't "any place for this wholesome marital sex in this kind of book".
God Does Not Own This World: Once his payment of the adaptation-related royalties got late, Peter Benchley called his agent and she replied that the studio was arranging a deal for sequels. Benchley disliked the idea, saying, "I don't care about sequels; who'll ever want to make a sequel to a movie about a fish?" He subsequently relinquished the Jaws sequel rights, aside for a one-time payment of $70,000 for each one.
Sleeper Hit: In Peter Benchley's words, "I knew that Jaws couldn't possibly be successful. It was a first novel, and nobody reads first novels. It was a first novel about a fish, so who cares?" Yet the publisher saw potential, and their efforts made it a million seller by the time the movie came out.
Working Title: The Stillness in the Water, Leviathan Rising, The Jaws of Death and The Jaws of Leviathan (the pattern of the last made Benchley eventually choose simply Jaws). When Benchley couldn't think of a title in the first place, his father Nathaniel suggested the substantially less serious What's That Noshin' On Ma Leg.
Write Who You Know: Peter Benchley based Quint off a number of Long Island fishermen he knew, though the biggest inspiration seems to be Frank Mundus. A native of Montauk, Mundus gained regional notoriety as a "Monster Fisher" in the '50s and '60s who regularly took fishermen on shark hunting expeditions, and hunted with harpoons that weighed the sharks down with barrels, similar to Quint. He won national recognition for killing a then-record 4,500 pound Great White off Montauk in 1964, after which Benchley met him and accompanied him on several fishing trips while researching his book. Mundus was quite happy with the newfound fame the book and movie brought to him, and said his only complaint was that Benchley and Spielberg never credited him as the sole inspiration for the character.
Ben Gardner was played by local fishermen, farmer and eccentric Craig Kingsbury. Steven Spielberg described Kingsbury as "the purest version of who, in my mind, Quint was", and some of his offscreen utterances were incorporated into the script as lines of Gardner and Quint.
The medical inspector was played by a real doctor, Robert Nevin.
Completely Different Title: Many countries just bypassed the oblique title and went for the direct Shark (Spanish, Portuguese) or The Shark (Hungary, Italy). But for more specific cases:
French: "The Teeth of the Sea".
Finland: Killer Shark
Germany: The White Shark
Hong Kong and Taiwan: Great White Shark
Iceland: The Unknown
Netherlands: The Summer of the White Shark
Norway: Shark Summer
Creator Backlash: As was the case with Peter Benchley for the book, Steven Spielberg expressed regret that the film's portrayal apparently contributed to mistreatment and overhunting of sharks in real life.
Creator Couple: Lorraine Gary (Ellen Brody's actress) is the wife of Universal's then-president Sidney Sheinberg.
My goal was to find someone who had never been on the cover of Rolling Stone. I wanted somewhat anonymous actors to be in it so you would believe this was happening to people like you and me. Stars bring a lot of memories along with them and those memories can sometimes, at least in the first ten minutes of the movie, corrupt the story.
An alternate discovery of Chrissie's remains, with Brody forcing a reluctant Cassidy to identify her.
Mayor Vaughn trying to get Brody to do something about the kids using his fence for karate practice while on the car ferry.
Quint buying piano wire for his fishing pole and "encouraging" a boy playing a clarinet (and by encouraging we mean yelling at the kid).
On the way to cut open the tiger shark, Hooper tells Brody about a $1200 phone bill and a girl who liked phone sex.
Mrs. Kintner coming out of the town hall with her father after posting the reward notice and passing Quint who is getting out of his truck.
Ellen talking to Hooper over dinner about a documentary she saw on sea lions.
The shark hunters' flotilla battles amongst itself to pull up a tiger shark to claim the bounty.
There was an added scene shot for the fourth victim that showed him seemingly being pushed by the shark as he grabs Michael Brody and attempts to drag him down with him before dying and letting him go. Steven Spielberg decided that the scene should be cut because he felt that it was too bloody and in bad taste.
On the laserdisc version, there is an additional scene where Quint and his little friend are talking in a boathouse. His friend tells him he's not going with him to hunt the shark. Quint responds by calling him a "miserable little son of a bitch."
Four Japanese dubs were produced. The first premiered on Nippon TV in 1981, the second on TBS in 1991 and the third on TV Tokyo in 2004. For the 30th anniversary release in 2005, a fourth dub was produced. Kenji Utsumi voiced Quint in the 1991 TBS dub and Kenyuu Horiuchi voiced Hooper in the 2004 TV Tokyo dub; both actors reprised their roles for the 2005 DVD release.
In Latin America, the film was dubbed into Spanish twice. The first dub featured VÃctor Mares as Brody, Guillermo Romano as Quint and Salvador Nájar as Hooper. The second featured Pedro D'Aguillón Jr. as Brody, Paco Mauri as Quint and Carlos Becerril as Hooper. Arturo Mercado voiced Hendricks and a reporter in the first dub, and later voiced Vaughn in the second dub.
Brazil had a São Paulo dub created for its TV debut, and one from Rio de Janeiro made for the DVD.
Enforced Method Acting: Richard Dreyfus has said he truly was as enraptured as he appears by Robert Shaw's performance when Quint tells the story of the Indianapolis.
Fountain of Expies: As this review notes, Jaws inspired hundreds of killer animal movies, with Quint and Vaughn being the source (or at least the codifiers) for a large number of imitations.
Hostility on the Set: The relationship between Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss was notoriously antagonistic, which of course carried over into their characters. Roy Scheider described Shaw as "a perfect gentleman whenever he was sober. All he needed was one drink and then he turned into a competitive son-of-a-bitch." The feud, along with the film's generally troubled shoot as a whole, inspired the comedic stage play The Shark is Broken, which was co-written by Ian Shaw, the son of Robert.
On one occasion, Shaw was having a drink between takes, at which one point he announced, "I wish I could quit drinking." Much to the surprise and horror of the crew, Dreyfuss simply grabbed Shaw's glass and tossed it into the ocean.
Like Scheider, Dreyfuss felt that Shaw had a dual nature. He could be very generous and charming in private, such as the time he read Dreyfuss his entire play, The Man in the Glass Booth, while the two were sitting in the hold of the Orca. On another occasion, Shaw suggested to Dreyfuss that once production ended, they costar in a Shakespeare play together.note Dreyfuss was deeply flattered but told Shaw that he didn't have anywhere near the chops to perform opposite Shaw onstage. He told Shaw to ask him again in ten years, by which time Shaw had passed away. Publicly, however, Shaw was brutal to him, telling him things like he thought Dreyfuss would only have a career "if there's room for another Jewish character man like Paul Muni." At one point, Shaw, remarking loudly on what he said was Dreyfuss' cowardice, dared him to climb to the top of the Orca's mast (about 75 feet) and jump off into the ocean, for which he would pay him upwards of $1,000 (the price rising with each taunt). Steven Spielberg finally intervened by telling Dreyfuss, "I don't care how much money he offers you, you're not jumping off the mast, not in my movie."
Another time, Shaw drenched Dreyfuss with a fire hose. Dreyfuss yelled at him, "That's it, I don't want to work with you anymore, go fuck yourself" and stormed off the set for the day.
Life Imitates Art: Beach attendance dropped sharply for the summer of 1975.
Money, Dear Boy: Robert Shaw initially turned down the film, as he didn't like the book it was based on. He finally accepted since he also owed money to the IRS. According to his son Ian, Shaw's decision was also influenced when a remake of Brief Encounter he planned to star in became snagged in Development Hell, and Shaw chose to take the guaranteed paycheck over a passion project that might never be made.note Brief Encounter ultimately was produced, as a widely-panned television movie with Richard Burton and Sophia Loren.
Pop-Culture Urban Legends: In 2015, Joe Hill (Stephen King's son) spotted an uncredited female extra in the Fourth of July scene wearing jeans and a blue bandana, who he theorized was "the lady of the dunes", later identified as Ruth Marie Terry, whose body was found later that summer in Provincetown, 100 miles from Martha's Vineyard, wearing similar clothes. Investigators have dismissed the connection as unlikely and wild speculation.
Production Nickname: Bruce for the first shark. Spielberg himself called it Great White Turd due to its breakdowns.
The scene where Brody, Hooper and Quint drunkenly sing "Show Me the Way to Go Home" unintentionally captured the mood of most people on set at that point in the movie's grueling production, to the point where multiple crew members started crying.
Hooper and Quint's antagonistic relationship and view of each other, Quint seeing Hooper as a rich college boy with no experience in real work and Hooper seeing Quint as a barely functional drunk and his frustration with his "working class hero crap", is very similar to Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss' real working relationship and view of one another.
The Red Stapler: Inverted. Beach attendance dropped significantly after this movie.
Science Marches On: Much more has been learned about shark behavior since 1975. As a consequence, most of the theories Hooper voices, believed to be valid at the time, have since been disproven. At the time, the general conception really was that great white sharks are "mindless eating machines". It has since been proven that great whites have a complex social hierarchy, distinctive personalities, and definitely a capacity for learning and rudimentary reasoning.
There were problems with getting the mechanical shark to work, forcing the creators to turn it into mostly The Unseen.
Quint's Indianapolis speech was only recorded because the crew was waiting around for "Bruce" to be repaired (again), so Spielberg added more dialogue to keep from wasting so much shooting-time. It wound up being the dramatic high point of the film.
Hooper was Spared by the Adaptation because when shooting scenes in Australia with actual sharks and a miniature cage and diver, there was that great take of the shark rolling on top of the shark cage - but it was empty (the stuntman had fled for his life). So instead of the shark tearing Hooper to pieces (per the novel), the filmmakers changed the script to have Hooper escape and survive. As executive Bill Gilmore put it, "The sharks down in Australia rewrote the script and saved Dreyfuss's character."
Quint's rant to Brody about getting the Mayor off his back so he wouldn't "have any more of this zoning crap" reflects the fact that the real-life town of Martha's Vineyard almost didn't allow the building of the set for Quint's shack due to zoning regulations, only allowing a variance at the last minute... then ironically wanted the production to leave it standing as a tourist attraction afterwards. They refused, pointing out that under the town's own laws they would have to pay daily fines for failing to tear down the set.
Spared by the Cut: When filming in Australia, the crew managed to capture a too-awesome-not-to-use shot of a shark rolling on top of Hooper's shark cage. However, the cage was empty at the time because the stuntman had already swam for his life. Thus, to avoid creating a continuity error, the film was rewritten so Hooper escapes his encounter with the shark instead of being torn to pieces as in the original novel.
Spoiler Opening: The 1995 20th Anniversary Collector's Edition home video release included a making-of retrospective.... which played before the main feature, revealing every single plot element including the ending.
Roy Scheider ad-libbed the famous "You're gonna need a bigger boat." line.
The shooting star that appears as Brody loads his revolver on the boat is real, not something added in post-production.
The footage of the Shark rolling on top of the shark cage wasn't planned, but it was considered far too awesome not to use. This lead to Hooper surviving, since he wasn't in the shot.
The Indianapolis speech was written by Howard Sackler. Robert Shaw then rewrote some of it, turning it into a monologue. It was Spielberg who felt that Quint needed a motivation for his quest. Its inclusion in the final film is only because yet another shark shot failed.
"The Body of Mary Lee" poem was thrown in by Robert Shaw. When the producers asked who wrote it so that they could be sure to get the rights, Shaw assured them the rights wouldn't be an issue: he'd found it on an old tombstone in Ireland.
Troubled Production: The film became Hollywood's first true Summer Blockbuster and the Trope Codifier for the Threatening Shark trope, but its production is legendary for its many troubles (which would start a tradition for the series, as you can see in the ''Jaws'' folder here). So legendary in fact that for many the production of the movie is just as, if not more, interesting than the film itself.
Richard Dreyfuss summed it up as follows: "We started the film without a script, without a cast and without a shark." Principal photography began without a completed script or shark props, and Carl Gottlieb frequently wrote script pages on the night before shooting. Steven Spielberg, inexperienced with large-scale filmmaking at the time, insisted on shooting in open waters. This decision created many of the headaches experienced during shooting.
The problems from shooting in open waters included soaked cameras, ruined takes because unwanted sailboats drifted into frame, cast and crew having to make long journeys to and from the sea, and at one point the ship began sinking with the actors aboard. Out of a 12-hour working day, only four hours would be spent actually filming... and that was on a good day. On a bad day there would be no filming at all.
Many days of filming were ruined by problems with the shark props. Three full-size mechanical sharks were built for the film at great expense, and one sank to the bottom of the ocean on its first day, forcing a team of divers to retrieve it. All three models frequently malfunctioned due to exposure to salt water, forcing Spielberg (who had initially considered the shark effects to be the film's true star) to work around the issues and only hint at the shark in many scenes. He later credited the shark problems for the film's suspense, saying "It made me become more like Alfred Hitchcock than like Ray Harryhausen.".
Robert Shaw had taken the role of Quint mainly to pay off his tax debts, and he frequently flew back and forth to Canada from Martha's Vineyard during filming to avoid further attention from the IRS. While said to be pleasant while sober, his frequently drinking on the set brought out his irascible and competitive worst, and he quickly found an enemy in Dreyfuss; Shaw regularly taunted Dreyfuss as cowardly (at one point he dared Dreyfuss to climb to the top of the ship's mast and jump from it) and even sprayed him down with a firehose. Meanwhile, Dreyfuss threw Shaw's drinking glass into the ocean between takes.
The film had been assigned a budget of $4 million, but wound up $5 million over budget for a total of $9 million (that was a lot back in 1974). Filming had fallen over 100 days behind schedule - what was initially meant to be a 55-day shoot ended up at 159 days. Spielberg thought he would never work again, and refused to show up to the final day of filming as he felt that the exhausted and disgruntled crew would throw him in the water as payback for the miserable shootnote how miserable? The scene where Quint, Hooper, and Brody drunkenly sing on the ship made many crew members start crying too, because the song - "show me the way to go home, I'm tired and I want to go to bed" - reflected how they felt.
June Foray did some uncredited voice work for Michael and Sean during some of the out door scenes.
The ADR crowd voices (a first in the film industry) are similarly uncredited, with a few of the actors, including both Michael McKean in one of his first acting parts, and Harry Shearer, having been revealed after the fact.
Voice-Only Cameo: Steven Spielberg is the voice on Quint's marine radio, when Mrs. Brody tries to contact her husband on the "Orca."
Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: Richard Dreyfuss famously quipped that filming started without a script, without a cast and without a shark. Carl Gottlieb finished the pages the night before they'd be shot, often taking advantage of whatever Spielberg and the cast thought during dinner.
Carl Gottlieb, who plays newspaper editor Meadows, is one of the credited screenwriters and responsible for most of the shooting script.
Robert Shaw himself made a significant contribution to the Indianapolis speech.
The original classic is on Roger Ebert's Great Movies List. He was unsurprisingly unfond of the other three, even giving Jaws: The Revenge a zero star rating, indicating that the movie offended him.
In 2015, horror author Joe Hill propagated a theory that one of the extras in the July 4th scene might be the Lady of the Dunes, a notorious unidentified murder victim from the area at the time of filming, due to her resemblance to an artist's rendering and wearing a similar-looking bandana that was found with the body. Several others have embraced the theory and hope it might lead to the case being solved, while still more dismiss it as wild speculation. The woman's identity was later discovered to be Ruth Marie Terry in 2022, but it is still unclear if she was the unknown extra.
The drunken Chief Brody complains about the crime rate in New York. Roy Scheider's last role before Jaws was as a New York cop in The French Connection.
The ride:
The Danza: All of the skippers' names are what the actual team members' names are.
Executive Veto: When Halloween Horror Nights returned to the Studios park in 2006, the ride's skippers put together their own script that was more profane and violence-based that they hoped they would be able to use during the event nights. When the employees presented the script to the resort's higher-ups, they rejected it and forced them to stick to the regular script for reasons unknown.
Extended Universe: The employees of the Florida version of the ride made a fan film called The JAWS Ride Movie: Death of Gordon, which serves as a prequel and side story to the ride and set in the reality presented in the show's queue. The film introduces us to the ill-fated Gordon who ends up on Amity 3, who originally gets a routine tour but swaps tours with a coworker for a VIP tour so he could get a bigger tip, as well as showing us the "real" Brody, who apparently is having an affair with a coworker at the sheriff's station and everything going on at base during the chaotic shark attack on Amity 6.
Throw It In!: The skipper sometimes will make a slight change to their spiel to poke fun at the reactions of the riders, and there are situations where the skipper will be forced to due some improvising, such as if they accidentally drop the grenade launcher into the water. note Yes, it actually has happened before.
Troubled Production: A rather serious case, as the ride was essentially non-functional when it first opened. It had to be completely shut down and reworked entirely, and it took three years for the ride to finally be opened up again. Universal even sued the people who manufactured the original version of the ride.
off a number of Long Island fishermen he knew, though the biggest inspiration seems to be Frank Mundus. A native of Montauk, Mundus gained regional notoriety as a "Monster Fisher" in the '50s and '60s who regularly took fishermen on shark hunting expeditions, and hunted with harpoons that weighed the sharks down with barrels, similar to Quint. He won national recognition for killing a then-record 4,500 pound Great White off Montauk in 1964, after which Benchley met him and accompanied him on several fishing trips while researching his book. Mundus was quite happy with the newfound fame the book and movie brought to him, and said his only complaint was that Benchley and Spielberg never credited him as the sole inspiration for the character.