If one follows the production history of Jaws, it’s truly remarkable the film got made at all. The issues with production are legendary, and almost laughingly accurate. From when Universal picked up the rights to when that iconic John Williams score plays under the opening credits on the big screen, problems plagued Steven Spielberg and company almost daily.

The story begins in 1973. Producers Richard D. Zanuck and David Brown were given a copy of the novel and were hooked. They knew it had the makings for a great movie, so they went through their checklist. The story? Good. Can we afford to make it? We can't not afford to make it, so yes. Will author Peter Benchley draw up a screenplay? He's agreed to do up to three, so yes. Should we grab it now before another studio grabs it? Absolutely yes. So they bought the movie rights for $175,000, before the novel had even been released to the public. The question they should have asked? Can it be made. In their haste, they hadn't really thought about what it would take to actually film the movie. We'll call that issue #1.

Hiring Steven Spielberg

jaws Steven Spielberg social
Image Via Universal

But they had the rights, the novel was flying off the shelves - they had to make the movie, period. They initiated the process by looking for a director. They first approached director John Sturges, who declined, as did their second choice, Dick Richards. The name of 26-year-old wunderkind Steven Spielberg came up, so they went through another checklist. Can he direct? Yes. Has he directed a feature length film? Yes, the TV movie Duel and The Sugarland Express. Has he directed a big budget feature length film? No. Has he filmed any monster movies? Does actress Goldie Hawn count? Then no. Is he available and under contract? Yes, and yes. Welcome aboard, Mr. Spielberg.

Writing and Re-Writing the Script

While this was happening, novel author Peter Benchley submitted three screenplay drafts, each of which hewed more toward the events in the book. This included a number of subplots, including the mayor having mob ties, that the novel was filled with (wisely, a subplot about Ellen Brody having an affair with Hooper was not included). Spielberg looked the drafts over, and let out a mighty sigh. Not one of them matched his vision of the project. Spielberg had no interest in the subplots. He, rightly, wanted the main focus of the film to be on the shark and the men hunting it, period. Playwright Howard Sackler was brought in, and he agreed to an uncredited rewrite of the entire script. Spielberg read his version over. The rewrite addressed some of the issues that Spielberg had with Benchley's draft, but something still wasn't right. The overall feel of the script was dark, and the characters were largely unlikable, which is an issue when you're filming a movie about a killer shark and the audience is on the shark's side. So he turned to comedy writer and friend Carl Gottlieb to lighten up the script. "Lighten up a script... for a killer shark film?" he must have thought to himself, "Why not add some scenes of Norman Bates doing stand-up comedy routines to Psycho while I'm at it?" Nevertheless, he agreed.

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The project would end up being larger than Gottlieb or Spielberg envisioned, leading to Gottlieb becoming the primary screenwriter. The problem was, and we'll call this issue #2, there was no way to rewrite the entire screenplay before shooting was to begin. This led to scenes being scripted while filming, and often not finished until the night before shooting.

Casting

Jaws - Three men on a boat looking at the ocean water
Image via Universal Pictures

Confident that the screenplay side was in good hands, the time came to focus on the cast. First choices for cast members didn’t bite (no pun intended). Paul Newman and Robert Duvall were among those considered for the role of Brody, but Spielberg didn't want a big name star in the film, so Newman wasn't approached and Duvall would only come on board if he could play Quint. Charlton Heston spread the word that he would be interested in playing Brody, but even the mighty Moses didn't fit Spielberg's vision. Eventually, Spielberg would find his Chief Brody in actor Roy Scheider. There certainly was nothing happening on the casting front that was abnormal from any other big Hollywood production, though, so similar situations with the role of Brody begat the casting the roles of Quint and Matt Hooper. Finally, Spielberg found his cast. He agreed with Zanuck and Brown's suggestion of Robert Shaw for the role of Quint, and likewise agreed with fellow director and friend George Lucas to cast American Graffiti alum Richard Dreyfuss as Matt Hooper.

Shooting in the Ocean

With the cast now in place, it was time to start filming. Call it bravado, call it naïveté, or call it artistic vision, but Spielberg made the decision to film on the ocean, a first for major features. Call it issue #3. Features set on the ocean were typically filmed on set in a large tank, or in shallower waters, but never on the ocean itself. The reason why became very obvious, very quickly. Bad weather, sailboats that drifted into frame, and soaking wet cameras were cause for many delays. One time, the Orca began to sink while the actors were on board. If Spielberg didn't think he was in over his head yet, he certainly had to be feeling it now.

Bruce the Shark

Roy Scheider fighting off a shark in Jaws
Image via Universal Pictures

Thankfully, three sharks were built for the film, collectively named Bruce after Spielberg's friend and lawyer Bruce Ramer, and they looked great, but inevitably became issue #4. What should have been taken as an omen occurred on land, when one would bite down on George Lucas' head in the shop, the result of a practical joke misfire, prompting the jaws of the shark to be pried open to let Lucas out. Minor setback, easily fixed, no harm done. So a shark was taken out to the water for a test run. Two things sank that day: the shark itself, right to the bottom of the ocean, and Spielberg's heart. And that wasn't the end of the shark problems. Salt water, fractures, an absorbent-proof skin that absorbed, and corrosion led to the sharks consistently breaking down. It was happening on such a frequent basis that Spielberg realized he, somehow, had to make a shark film with no shark (for those counting, issue #5). So Spielberg, as did many other directors, looked to the acronym WWHD (What Would Hitchcock Do), and decided to change the approach from the horror of seeing the shark to, instead, the shark being the unseen, unknown sense of dread and horror.

Surely that had to be the extent of the issues that plagued the filming, right? Nope. The cast, all professional actors, appeared to be a cohesive unit, even improvising character lines to help Gottlieb out on his nightly script writing (from whence came the famous "we're gonna need a bigger boat"). Only one tiny problem: Shaw and Dreyfuss hated each other, adding an unwanted tension to a set already besieged by tension. Issue #6.

At last shooting was finished, and Spielberg could move on to post-production. Issue free? Kind of. Ironically, two scenes where the shark was actually working would end up on the cutting room floor. An alternate shot of the deadly attack on young Alex Kintner (Jeffrey Voorhees) and an alternate shot of the shark attacking the would-be rescuer from the estuary were cut due to excessive gore and Spielberg's change of approach to the shark in the film. Additionally, upon hearing John Williams' score for the movie, Spielberg laughed, believing the dun dun to be a joke that Williams was playing on him.

Jaws, Shark

All of this amounted to an additional 100+ days of shooting, 159 versus the planned 55. In turn, the budget came in at $12 million, 300% over the initial allocation and four times the cost of an average film in 1975. Now, with the movie finally being completed and in the can, Spielberg prepared for the worst: the end of his career in Hollywood before it even truly began.

Despite it All, 'Jaws' Was a Success

He needn't have worried. Jaws to date has made $470,700,000 worldwide, a whopping 97.45% over its $12 million budget. It set new precedents for the industry: multi-theater release at the same time; the "summer blockbuster" (summer was largely seen as off-season to that point); and increased budgets for advertising and marketing of films. It redefined the public's perception of the shark worldwide, and launched Spielberg to the top tier of Hollywood directors. Here's the irony: the things that threatened to destroy the film during filming ended up being the very things that keep Jaws at, or near, the top of any critic's pick of best Hollywood films. The ocean shooting that lends a stark realism to the hunt. The last-minute scripts, buoyed by actor input that personalizes the dialogue for them. The 'laughable' score that heightened the tension, further heightened again by feuds and frustration offscreen. Most importantly, the persistent issues with the sharks leading to Spielberg shifting course to a more Hitchcockian approach with the shark, petrifying audiences with the terror of the unseen.

But there was no way in hell he was signing on for Jaws 2.