“The Shark Is Broken,” a comedy about the making of “Jaws” that stars the son of one of the film’s main actors, will open on Broadway this summer.
The play is the brainchild of Ian Shaw, whose father, Robert Shaw, played Quint, the psychotic shark hunter, in the film. Its film set was plagued by problems, some exacerbated by Robert Shaw’s drinking, and the play depicts the fraught relationship between him and his co-stars, Richard Dreyfuss and Roy Scheider.
In the play, set in 1974, the three men are trapped together on a boat, managing bad weather, (fake) shark troubles and alcohol.
The play began its life at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2019, opened in London’s West End in 2021 after a pandemic-related delay, and had a production in Toronto last fall. The Broadway run is to begin previews on July 25 and to open on Aug. 10 at the Golden Theater.
The play received a number of strong reviews in London, including from The Evening Standard, which said Ian Shaw “gives what is undoubtedly one of the best theatrical performances of the year.” (The Guardian was more restrained, saying that “too much of the humor hinges on 21st-century hindsight” but also praising Ian Shaw’s “loving and eerily evocative portrayal of his own father.”)
Ian Shaw wrote the play with Joseph Nixon; the production is being directed by Guy Masterson and produced by Sonia Friedman and Scott Landis.
The play joins what is shaping up to be an unusually busy summer on Broadway. There is already horror (“Grey House”) and farce (“The Cottage”) represented, along with three big musicals (“Once Upon a One More Time,” “Here Lies Love,” “Back to the Future”) and a solo comedy (Alex Edelman’s “Just for Us”).
