A Fast Day, and Fast Times at the Gazebo
My brother, the bane of Stephen Spielberg.
My brother told me a story today that I can’t believe I hadn’t heard before.
“Did I ever tell you about the time when Stephen Spielberg got pissed off at me?” he asked.
I, who have so far written three articles on “Jaws,” was stunned. How could there be a story this close to home without me knowing about it?
“No,” I answered.
“Ok, it goes like this. You remember that Becky and I were in the band, sitting in the gazebo. Spielberg came over and gave us simple directions. He told us that when a certain extra stands up and yells ‘Shark,’ we were to set our instruments down and run to the water’s edge and help the fleeing swimmers get out.”
I could already see where this was heading. My brother was his father’s son, a born showboat.
“So, Spielberg shouts out ‘Action,” the extra shouted ‘Shark,’ and we put down our instruments and started to run towards the water. Just as I was stepping out of the gazebo I paused and raised my hand to shield my eyes from the sun, looked out to sea, and shouted ‘Where?’”
“Cut!” Spielberg said.
“This was in early May, and the water was freezing. Those poor kids were turning blue. Four hundred extras were looking at me. Spielberg took a few steps towards me, stopped, raised his megaphone, and shouted: ‘The extras in the gazebo shall do as they are told!’”
On the next take I got it right.
“What possessed you to do that?” I asked.
“Look. I was sixteen. I didn’t have a girlfriend. I sensed possibilities but the competition was intense. I needed a way to stand out in the crowd, to get noticed by the girls.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“Actually, my plan worked after a fashion.” he said.
“How’s that?” I said.
“One of those shivering girls that I helped out of the water became my wife twelve years later,” he said.
Now that’s a Vineyard story.
This is the first article I wrote about Jaws. I am promoting it as I did last year before the fast of Tisha B’Av. This year is also the fiftieth anniversary of Jaws.
Tisha B'Av and Jaws
The saddest day in Judaism drops on us in the middle of summer, and since it lasts from sundown until nightfall the following day, it is a long sad day. It is the fast day of Tisha B’Av, and it is a grinding wheel of a fast. It is not an official holiday, and I remember when I was younger fasting while working in factories…
After having written the above, I googled Richard Dreyfus and was surprised.
I wrote this a couple of weeks ago. One of my favorite readers let me have it and told me that I had gone a bit too far with this satire. He may be right.
Jaws at Fifty
I’ve been saying it. I’ve been saying it for fifty damn years. Ain’t I been saying it Miguel? Nobody listened then, maybe someone will listen now. What’s so infuriating to me is that the truth has been obvious from the very beginning. How can it be that I am the only one who sees it? Go ahead. Laugh. I’m immune …
Lol. That's a much better story than the run-in I had with Woody Allen in 1979 when he tried to prevent me from entering my friends apartment building in Greenwich Village to feed her cat. It delayed the shooting of the film "Manhattan" by about three minutes, but it still turned out to be one of his best. That was years before we learned about the kind of shark Woody Allen was.