Barebones Lands a Big One with ‘The Shark Is Broken’

Often, a movie actor’s job consists of being a waiter. You may spend lots of time waiting for the next scene and the next to be set up properly. This was especially true with Jaws, Steven Spielberg’s 1975 shark-attack classic. Filming was scheduled to be done in less than two months, but it took more than 100 days longer, as the production crew had to wrestle repeatedly with Mother Nature and balky equipment for the scenes shot at sea off Martha’s Vineyard. 

And what did the actors do during all the downtime? Today we have a fictionalized answer. The Shark Is Broken, by co-playwrights Ian Shaw (son of the late Jaws star Robert Shaw) and Joseph Nixon, runs through June 22 at barebones productions. The play’s title refers to the mechanical shark named Bruce, which was built because a real shark couldn’t be tamed to play the role, and which malfunctioned frequently. The play itself is worth seeing for two reasons. 

First, it’s a fascinating addition to the category of shows about show business. Most plays of this type are focused on the world of live theater: The characters are fictional stage actors, putting on fictional plays-within-the-play. That’s what you get in the popular comedy Noises Off, or in David Mamet’s A Life in the Theatre (produced last year in Pittsburgh by Kinetic Theatre). 

The Shark Is Broken breaks that mold. It gives you a behind-the-scenes look at the making of an actual movie. And there’s plenty of cool insider stuff to be gleaned from the play, particularly if you are a Jaws fan. In many respects the playwrights have stayed close to what really happened when Jaws was filmed. You find out, for example, that the script of the movie was constantly being rewritten during the breaks between scenes. At one point in the play, Robert Shaw complains spectacularly about having to learn and perform a stupid new monologue he’s been given. If you know Jaws, you’ll get an ironic chuckle from knowing that the monologue turned out to be one of the most famous bits in the film.

But you don’t even need to have seen Jaws to enjoy The Shark Is Broken. Although the inside references are cool, they are not essential. The play’s crowning feature is that it delivers a darned good buddy story. One loaded with laughs, which are made funnier—and ultimately, touching—because they ring true to real life. 

Does Your Head Spin? Try This Intro

The play does take a bit of acclimation. It can spin your head because the three characters are actual actors playing characters in Jaws, and each is played in turn by a barebones actor. 

At the core is the English actor Robert Shaw, who played the professional shark hunter Quint in the movie. He’s played here by Patrick Jordan, the founding artistic director of barebones productions. Richard Dreyfuss, who played the marine biologist Hooper, is acted by Quinn Patrick Shannon. And Roy Scheider, cast in the movie as the town sheriff Brody, is played by Patrick Cannon. 

Now to describe each character in a nutshell. Shaw is (and really was) the distinguished grand old man of the bunch—a veteran Shakespeare actor, further esteemed as a novelist and a playwright. Shaw’s downsides: He’s a fearsomely heavy drinker whose genial nature can easily drift into arrogance and cruelty. Dreyfuss is an aspiring young actor from Brooklyn. The play probably overstates how naive he really was, but he becomes the target of some wicked tricks played upon him by Shaw. And Scheider? Given the circumstances, Scheider must be the adult in the room—mediating between the other two guys, while he tries to manage Shaw’s drunken escapades and Dreyfuss’s bumbling attempts to find and assert himself. 

All of The Shark Is Broken takes place in the cabin of a boat moored offshore. It’s the actors’ hangout while they wait to perform and (ideally) prepare for their scenes. The action unfolds in a series of vignettes, separated by blackouts. And as this reviewer sees it, the action ramps up to higher, more rewarding levels after a worrisome start. 

A Dramatic Turnaround

The play opens on Roy Scheider seated in the cabin, reading a newspaper. He’s holding it so you can read the bold headline splashed across the front page: “NIXON RESIGNS.” This is a device to set the time frame. It tells you we’re in 1974, when said president left office due to the Watergate scandal. The device also triggers the play’s first big laugh line. When his fellow actors join him, Scheider comments that at least “There will never be a more immoral president than Richard Nixon.”

Ha-ha. If only he had known, right? But while audience members roared on the night when I attended, the line struck me as part of an initial sequence that seemed to foreshadow a very bad play. There were several jokes in a similar vein—easy laughs, at characters misinterpreting events of their time in the 1970s, which we now see differently. I don’t enjoy comedies that take potshots at sitting ducks. Nor do I enjoy plays with characters who come across as gross stereotypes, as the characters in The Shark Is Broken came across to me, initially: the swaggering, pompous Shakespearean drunkard. The gee-whiz new kid on the block. The smug know-it-all (Scheider) who spouts facts and logic, but in fact doesn’t know it all. 

For a number of minutes, I squirmed in my seat. Squirmed at the prospect of being forced to review a stinker from a theater company I love. But then gradually—and before long, totally—the play’s magic kicked in. 

The characters deepened. Shaw, behind his overbearing arrogance, began to show flashes of genuine feeling for his comrades. Some glimmers of self-awareness as well. (And really, how could he not? Only rare creatures among us humans are beastly to the bone.) Dreyfuss, meanwhile, began emerging from his fog of naivete, displaying not just gumption but keen insights and deep sensitivity. (Actor Shannon plays the role nicely, even mimicking the real Dreyfuss’s nasal whine when he speaks.)  As the various pieces came together, I found myself laughing from the gut. And at the same time I felt for the characters, cared about them, from the heart. 

Bullseye

At the risk of giving spoilers I’ll mention a scene that sums up the combined impact. Late in the play, young Dreyfuss suffers a florid crisis of un-self-confidence. He feels foolish, worthless. He’s a quivering mess. He begs Scheider to tell him what the cast and crew are saying about him behind his back. Scheider replies, “Don’t you think you’re being a little paranoid?” Dreyfuss, bug-eyed, blurts “Is that what they’re saying?” Now there’s a laugh line I can relate to. 

And then, to help calm the kid, Shaw chimes in. Not by babbling empty words of comfort, but by softly reciting Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29: “When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes, I all alone beweep my outcast state …” It’s utterly in character for Shaw to do such a thing. And it’s beautiful. 

Lately we have quite a few bro comedies floating around. Many are aimed at depicting how bros can break through the macho barrier to achieve true male bonding, provided they dare to be sufficiently caring or vulnerable. The Shark Is Broken aims at the highbrow bro-comedy target and scores a bullseye.

The guys in this play never lose their rough, macho edges. Instead of mutating, they do something more realistic. If one may use such a feminine verb, they blossom. 

Closing Credits and Ticket Info

Ian Shaw’s and Joseph Nixon’s The Shark Is Broken is directed for barebones productions by Steve Parys. I would moreover credit Ian Shaw by calling the play a fine, fine tribute to his late father. Through June 22 in the barebones black box, 1211 Braddock Ave., Braddock. Tickets are officially sold out but new performances are being added and a waitlist is maintained, so check barebones on the web for details. 

Scenic design is by Tony Ferrieri, assisted by Noah Glaister. The production director is Douglas McDermott. Lighting is by Andrew David Ostrowski, sound by Andrew Michel (with operator Ian Bowen), and props by Rikkilee Rose. Don Wadsworth served as voice coach, and the stage manager is Claire Durr. 

Photos by Lou Stein.

Mike Vargo, an independent writer based in Pittsburgh, covers theater and other art forms for Entertainment Central. 

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