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[0:01] Alan Seales: Welcome to The Theatre Podcast. Intimate, personal conversations with the industry's biggest names. I am your host, Alan Seales, and this episode is a special bonus episode that takes you to the The Shark is Broken RED CARPET opening night that happened August 10th, 2023. Yeah, I attended The Shark is Broken. It's a story based on true events of the filming of Jaws. It's co-written by Ian Shaw, who's the son of Robert Shaw, the actor who played the shark hunter Quint in the movie. So including Ian, I got to talk to a bunch of amazing people, including Patti Murin, Alex Brightman, Elizabeth Teeter, and even Christian Slater. But I just want to get us started here. I'll play a quick story that James Monroe Iglehart told me after asking him if Jaws was one of the movies that influenced him as a kid.

[0:52] James Monroe Iglehart: I didn't know how to swim when I first saw Jaws. And nothing like going to Bakersfield, California with my really, really, really extremely mean cousins, and they all know how to swim. And I'm in the little end, and they drag me and then start singing the Jaws theme. The great part is, we're all in our late 40s, and these don't remember nothing. They never seem to remember the bad things they did, but that is burned into my memory. So I had to learn how to swim just because, one, I didn't want to get beat up by them, and two, I always thought, you never see black people get eaten by sharks, except in Deep Blue Sea. And that's because they're stupid. And I love Samuel L. Jackson's character. But you didn't see nobody black in Jaws. You know why? Because when the shark came, they stayed on the beach.

[1:43] Colin Donnell: Hey, I'm Colin Donnell. I am playing Roy Scheider in The Shark is Broken.

[1:47] Alan Seales: Colin just gives us a little insight here into what movies he watched to prepare to play Roy in the play.

[1:53] Colin Donnell: I have probably seen three or four. Marathon Man, all that jazz. I mean, look, I've seen some Sequest.

[2:03] Alex Brightman: Hi, everyone. I'm Alex Brightman, and I play Richard Dreyfuss in The Shark is Broken.

[2:08] Alan Seales: Alex then gives us a little insight into what he watched to prepare to play Richard.

[2:13] Alex Brightman: I don't have a movie that I studied for Richard, but I do have an interview I'd all want you to watch. It's Richard Dreyfuss. Go to YouTube. YouTube. Richard Dreyfuss. City Lights. City Lights. Richard Dreyfuss. City Lights interview. It's like a 30 minute long interview. It gave me everything I needed to know about this character. And I mean that. You'll see it's him right at the peak of where all this takes place. And it's just it's like a buffet of Richard Dreyfuss.

[2:41] Alan Seales: So, Alex Brightman, you're thinking Beetlejuice. You're thinking School of Rock. You're thinking his two Tony nominations for musicals. But when I asked him why he wants to be in this play, why he even auditioned, he gave a really cool answer.

[2:54] Alex Brightman: I have always loved plays. It's what I wanted to do originally. My first, yeah, my first professional gig ever was a play. I did The History Boys by Alan Bennett in Los Angeles at the Amundsen Theater in like 2006-7. And from that moment on, I went, it's going to be plays and that's it. And for the next however long it's been musicals. So I am thrilled to be doing a play. It's all I've ever wanted to do on Broadway. And by the way, ever. Not just on Broadway. What a statement. Just, I love doing this. I love to be able to act with no net. Like not be able to like lean on the idea that I can sing and maybe move. I can't dance. But yeah, this is just the best. I hope I get to do a million more. I like to be on stage. So like genuinely, I don't care where I am on stage. As long as there is like some light on me on a stage, I'm happy.

[3:40] Ian Shaw: My name's Ian Shaw and I'm playing Robert Shaw and I co-wrote the play Shark is Broken.

[3:46] Alan Seales: Ian never originally set out to write a play about his dad, Robert, or his dad's drinking problem or even the contentious relationship on set between Richard Dreyfuss and Robert.

[3:56] Ian Shaw: I mean, I'm finding it hard to take in actually. My brain, maybe in a week or two, I'll be able to process this, but I still feel like I'm in some weird dream. Well, is this where you set out to be with this or when you were starting to write it? Like was it more a cathartic experience?

[4:10] Ian Shaw: I was hoping to entertain people, but I was imagining that I would be touring around England in a van, you know, with the set in the back with the three actors. You know, that's how we designed it for Edinburgh. So I was expecting to be in village halls in England. So it was quite a surprise to find Sonia Friedman, you know, flying up to Edinburgh and very keen to pick up the show.

[4:45] Joseph Nixon: Ian has always avoided doing anything about his dad, I think, for various reasons. Ian read his dad's diaries and also he read the Jaws log as well. But one day he just thought, well, I'm the right age now. I'm the same age he was at this point in his life and maybe I should capitalize on it. I should do this thing. And it would be, well, he phoned me up and he said, I'm thinking about doing a play about Jaws, about the three main actors on a boat. Because, of course, he's an actor, Ian, and his thing is that film sets are the most boring place in the whole world, that you just sort of sit around for hours and then very occasionally something exciting happens and then it's back to the boredom and he wanted to do something about that as well.

And we quickly worked out that it's like a family, really. Robert Shaw's the dad, Roy Scheider's sort of this conciliatory figure. He's a bit sort of maternal, really. He's trying to calm things down. And then Dreyfus is the kid who's running around causing trouble. Basically, what this whole play is based on, and part of what happened in real life, is that because the mechanical shark kept breaking down, filming took weeks longer than anticipated. And the three guys, Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfus and Robert Shaw, they spent a lot more time together on set than they had originally planned, or then was scheduled, or that was even budgeted for. And so when I asked the guests on the red carpet what two people they'd love to get stuck on set with for weeks on end, let me give you a little montage of everyone's answers, starting with Robert Herjavec from Shark Tank.

[6:31] Robert Herjavec: Oh, Tom Cruise. Yes. Yes. Running, running, running. And Mariah Carey. I know she's not an actor, but it is Mariah Carey. I mean, come on, I do love Mariah Carey. Probably Chris Jackson and Nick Walker, just so we could just pester Nick forever. And he'd be in the middle. It'd be Chris on one side, me on the other, just Nick. Poor Nick. But we would have a good time. That's a very good question, and I don't want to rule some of these great people out. I'd like to be stuck with the Marx Brothers. I think Harpo and Chico and Groucho would be tremendous company.

[7:17] Coby Getzug: Okay, so I would probably would like to be on my own set waiting with Meryl Streep, and probably just for kicks, Jack Black. I feel like we'd have a nice time. We could all sing, all three of us sing. And all three of us are funny, but all three of us are probably so used to being asked to be funny and be on that we would have a nice time being off with each other, you know? Have I gotten to work with Meryl Streep? If I got to work with Meryl Streep, you wouldn't be hearing from me anymore. I'd be dead. No, I've never worked with Meryl Streep, but hi, if Meryl, if you're watching, please, please. Please.

[8:00] Unknown speaker: I guess Gary Oldman and Jeff Bridges.

[8:02] Unknown speaker: Fair. Fair. Okay.

[8:02] Unknown speaker: I mean, I would say Alex is one of them because we had, we were stuck together for a long time that Beetlejuice and never got tired of one another. And, oh, someone else. I don't know. You say, I don't know.

[8:17] Unknown speaker: John Malkovich and Ian McKellen.

[8:19] Unknown speaker: Very specific and good.

[8:22] Unknown speaker: Yeah. Well, I had time to think. I had time to think.

[8:24] Unknown speaker: Yeah.

[8:24] Unknown speaker: There's a lot of good actors.

[8:27] Unknown speaker: I know. I know. That's why I'm like, I don't know. I don't know any actor name ever. I just said in my last answer, Meryl Streep.

[8:35] Unknown speaker: So I'm going to say it again because...

[8:36] Unknown speaker: That's two for Meryl Streep.

[8:38] Unknown speaker: Yeah. I just, I want to meet her.

[8:40] Unknown speaker: I don't know. I think Will Ferrell will be a lot of fun. And I don't know, Mark Rylance is pretty spectacular. So the two of them, I would say.

[8:51] Unknown speaker: Probably Paul Rudd because he's very friendly and maybe Kate McKinnon. Good. Yeah. I think that would make it pass by really quickly.

[9:03] Coby Getzug: No show would actually ever be complete without the wonder studies that keep it going in the case of downtime, illness, injury, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So here's a little bit with Kobe Getzog and Steven Dexter.

[9:16] Kobe Getzug: Okay. Hi, I'm Kobe Getzog. I'm the understudy for Richard Dreyfuss and Roy Scheider. Do you have a favorite between the two of them?

[9:22] Steven Dexter: Ooh, they're both great in their own respects. I mean, I would say Richard Dreyfuss is closest to me. I'm a, you know, anxious Jew from California. So we have a lot of crossover there.

[9:32] Kobe Getzug: My name is Steven Dexter and I'm understudying all three leads, Robert Shaw, Richard Dreyfuss, Roy Scheider. I think that Scheider is the one I probably connect to the most, but Shaw is definitely the most fun.

[9:40] Steven Dexter: Because he's the most neurotic or the coolest?

[9:42] Kobe Getzug: I think the coolest. I think just the, yeah, the, the, I mean, you know, putting on the mutton chops and running the lines has been the most fun.

[9:53] Alan Seales: And lastly, no good red carpet interview for a show that included a shark would be complete without a reference to, you guessed it, West Side Story. When asked who the leader of the sharks is, we got some surprisingly wrong answers.

[10:06] Unknown speaker: This is such a dumb question. It's Bernardo, right? Yeah. I don't know. Tony. Oh, geez. I'm going to get my musical theater card taken away from this. It was Bernardo. Oh, thank goodness.

[10:18] Unknown speaker: Tony. Tony. No. No. I'm going to say Maria. No, Bernardo. Bernardo.

[10:26] Unknown speaker: Chica.

[10:27] Unknown speaker: Who's the leader of the sharks? Tony. I don't know. Bernardo. Wrong again. Chino.

[10:34] Unknown speaker: It is Bernardo. Sorry, it is Bernardo. Yeah, Bernardo. Yeah, yeah.

[10:37] Unknown speaker: Maria. Bernardo.

[10:38] Unknown speaker: Tony. Chino.

[10:40] Unknown speaker: It's Bernardo.

[10:44] Unknown speaker: I don't know. Is it Tony? No. It's Bernardo. Chino. It's Chino. It's Chino.

[10:51] Unknown speaker: Chino.

[10:52] Unknown speaker: It was Tony. I'm wrong. I'm wrong.

[10:58] Unknown speaker: Bernardo. Does everybody say Tony?

[11:00] Unknown speaker: Everyone says Chino.

[11:03] Alan Seales: Come on. This is a play, so we have to excuse them. That's it. Make sure to tell your friends, leave a five-star rating, leave a review, follow me on all the socials. Well, except maybe X. Screw that place. It's a hot mess. And just a gentle plug, regional theater is hurting right now post-pandemic. Whenever and wherever you can, please go see and support your local theater productions. Everything helps. Let's keep this industry alive. Thanks for listening.