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Ian Shaw as his father Robert Shaw. Picture: Helen Maybanks

The Shark is Broken

Malvern Theatres

****

The blockbuster film Jaws may have broken records at the box office, but it broke records of other kinds in its production. The challenges of creating an artificial shark (Bruce) to operate in salty sea waters resulted in the film going way over budget and schedule, leaving principal actors whiling away days and nights in frustrated limbo on a ship named ‘Orca’.

‘The Shark is Broken’ focuses on the three stars of the film Robert Shaw, Richard Dreyfus and Roy Scheider. They hover around almost like the characters in Waiting for Godot, playing games, drinking, getting on each other’s nerves, sometimes screaming and fighting, sometimes laughing and commiserating.

From the moment we enter the theatre we are met by the marvellous set designed by Duncan Henderson, which is brilliantly complemented by the lighting designed by Jon Clark. The wide seascape moving and changing in the background and the deck of the vessel in the foreground work superbly. The actors clamber in and out, up and down, incarcerated in this confined space for days and days.

The pressure exposes their inner fragilities and tests their relationships to the limits.

Ian Shaw, playing the role of his father Robert, is excellent. His alcoholism, his cynicism and disillusionment are starkly dominant; they result in his bullying conduct towards Dreyfuss in particular. Our understanding is invited when he talks of his childhood and the loss of his father. His artistic temperament, poetic and emotive sensitivity reflect his personal angst and lostness.

orca

Ashley Margolis plays the younger actor, Richard Dreyfuss. He has dreams of playing in a film that really is a hit movie. Despite the older man’s put-downs, he admires Robert Shaw’s Shakespearean success and links to successful writers like Harold Pinter. There is however a fragility underneath the bluster, the obscenities and the bravado.

Roy Scheider (Dan Fredenburgh) is the peacemaker who tries to keep a lid on the tensions between the other two. He brings a civilising restraint that avoids things getting out of control.

The pace, timing and rhythms of the dialogue make a strong dramatic impact. Ironic comments about ‘mediocre’ films that subsequently were hugely successful add another level of humour. Ironically Stephen Spielberg directed this first hit movie despite his fears: he was ‘scared that the film was terrible and that his young career was potentially over’!

There is little plot and development in this play. We have a highly dramatic and well written exploration of the tensions, the personal vulnerabilities and philosophical angst of these three men. We laugh frequently at the clever dialogues, the witty exchanges or even the shocking bluntness of their exchanges. Even for those who may not have watched the original blockbuster, this is powerful theatre and entertainment.

‘The Shark is Broken’ plays till Saturday 1st February in Malvern.

Tim Crow

28-01-25 

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