Who The Cast Of Jaws Could Have Been
It's hard to imagine anyone else in the roles of Brody, Quint and Hooper, apart from Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw and Richard Dreyfuss. Their delivery, dialogue and iconic look, are such an important part of the success story of the film, its longevity and legacy.
However, that almost holy trinity of actors weren't the first choice for their roles in Jaws, and the Dick Richards film...we mean Steven Spielberg film, as Spielberg replaced Richards as the films original director, could have had a very different cast.
The Daily Jaws plays casting agent and takes a look at those who, in an alternative Jaws universe, were in the running to have played the crew of the Orca.
Chief Brody
Charlton Heston was favoured by the studio as Amity's chief of police, although it's said that Spielberg felt that if the man who played Ben Hur, parted the red sea and took on an earthquake had played Brody then it woukd be a foregone conclusion that he would triumph against the giant shark. In the end Heston spent 1974 trying to fly a giant plane in Airport 1975.
Dolly zoom on Heston
Spielberg did want Heston to appear as the general in 1941 (1979), but Chuck found it to be mocking the military, so passed on the role. It went to Robert Stack instead.
Spielberg's first choice for the role of Brody had been Robert Duvall, who had recently gotten great reviews in The Godfather (1972). Duvall was interested in Jaws, but not in the role of Chief Brody, he wanted a shot at the role of Quint. Spielberg told him he was too young.
“Yeah, the lead. We talked for, like, two hours, me and Spielberg. There’s a lot of Portuguese (influence) up there, so I wanted to play (the Quint role) Portuguese, but I was too young.”
It's said that Spielberg first spotted Roy Scheider in The French Connection, someone who had previously played a New York cop was now perfectly placed to be playing a man who used to work as a New York cop. Perfect!
Another version states that Scheider pitched himself to Spielberg after spotting the director looking glum at a party and asking about the project he was working on.
Quint
Sterling Hayden was the fist actor to be offered the role of the shark hunter seeking vengeance. Hayden was perhaps best known as the corrupt police captain in Francis Ford Copolla's The Godfather (1972). He'd turned it down due to tax reasons.
It was next offered to Lee Marvin, but Marvin was more interested in spending his time fishing for real rather than pretending to fish. Marvin did star with Shaw in what would be his final film, Avalanche Express (1979), Shaw died before he could complete the film.
Jumping back to 1974, enter Robert Shaw, who had been suggested by one the producers Zanuck and Brown, who had both recently worked with the star on The Sting (1973). He'd also suffer tax issues, this time thanks to the seemingly never ending 159 day shoot.
Matt Hooper
It's said that Universal had wanted future Airwolf star, Jan-Michael Vincent, for the role of the young oceanographer - certainly if the affair from the book had survived itvtobthe film then you could certainly see how Ellen's eyes may have wandered. Ironically, Vincent did go onto co-star in a film called Hooper (1978) opposite Burt Reynolds.
Jeff Bridges was also mooted to have been in the running, as was Jon Voight.
Richard Dreyfuss has already turned down the role of Hooper twice, however having seen and not liked his performance in his forthcoming film, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, he was worries that he may never work again.
The rest isn't just history, it is Jaws history.
Words by Dean Newman
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