The Shark is Broken: A delightfully queer dive into cinematic history.
Darling, they’re going to need a bigger boat—and perhaps a larger stage—to contain the tsunami of talent washing over audiences in this gloriously intimate peek behind the cinematic curtain!
The Shark is Broken submerges us in the tempestuous waters of Spielberg’s troubled Jaws production, creating a theatrical experience that bites with wit and swims with unexpected emotional depth. This UK touring production, marking the film’s 50th anniversary, serves up a compressed 90-minute voyage aboard the Orca—where three magnificent actors thrash about in the confined quarters of masculine fragility and artistic temperament.
The play, written by Ian Shaw and local writer Joseph Nixon, debuted at the former Rialto Theatre in Brighton and is much as it was then, with a few added comedic set pieces but keeping its intimate, forensic focus on the off screen action as the leading men wait around to act.
Ian Shaw (literally embodying his father’s legacy), alongside Dan Fredenburgh and Ashley Margolis, delivers a performance so eerily accurate it’s as if the original trio has been resurrected from celluloid. The costume and makeup departments deserve applause for these impressive transformations.
Duncan Henderson‘s meticulously crafted set—a sliced-open Orca against Martha’s Vineyard seascapes—provides the perfect aquarium for these three specimens of Hollywood masculinity to circle each other with predatory charm. The evolving video backdrop captures the changing tides of both weather and emotional climate aboard this vessel of creative tension.
Full cast and creatives on the UK tour website
What makes this production particularly delicious is how it reframes one of cinema’s most famous display of heteronormative masculinity through a lens of vulnerability and artistic insecurity. The script dives deep beneath surface-level bickering to explore themes of addiction, ambition, and the peculiar intimacy that forms between men trapped in creative limbo.
Shaw’s relationship with alcohol emerges as a character in its own right—a spectral presence haunting the narrative with poignancy. Drawing inspiration from the elder Shaw’s personal drinking diaries, the production transforms a biographical footnote into theatrical excavation. The result feels less like homage and more an intimate psycho-spiritual séance, where son Ian communes with father Robert across the boundaries of time and mortality, creating a layered exploration of artistic legacy, familial inheritance, and the sometimes destructive wellsprings of creative brilliance.
While occasionally the narrative seems to float adrift—lacking the razor-sharp focus of its cinematic inspiration—the production never fully loses its bite. The show skillfully navigates between laugh-out-loud moments and poignant examinations of creative pressure, making this theatrical voyage anything but a washout.
To quote the immortal Quint: “This shark, swallow you whole.” Indeed, this production might just swallow your heart.
Until Saturday, April 12
For more info or to book tickets see the Theatre Royal Brighton’s website
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