A never-before-seen, hand-drawn sketch of Quint's (Robert Shaw) fishing vessel, “The Orca,” from the production of Steven Spielberg's blockbuster classic Jaws (Universal, 1975).This rudimentary, yet detailed sketch is realized primarily in black pen ink on an elongated sheet of lined yellow paper. It shows the iconic boat from an overhead angle, with multiple parts of the boat identified with handwriting. These identified parts include: “Bow,” “Fore Deck,” “Stack,” “Flying Bridge," “Chair,” and “Stern.” Certain elements are seen on the page to those familiar with the on-screen boat, including three circles drawn near the “Fore Deck,” which symbolize three of the yellow barrels that serve important plot purposes during the film's climactic final act. Multiple sections of the sketch have various indications on them, including circled “X's" near the parts labeled, “Stack,” Chair," “Flying Bridge,” and on the left side of the “Bow.” The word “Chair” is also underlined, as is the word “Stern,” which also features an asterisk next to it. The underline and asterisk around “Stern” are done in pencil. The handwriting of the various parts of the boat does appear as if multiple people wrote on the page as certain words appear to be done in different hands. “Flying Bridge” has a distinctively different “F” than the one that appears with “Fore Deck,” for example. Similarly, the “i” in “Chair” is dotted with a full circle, which is different than the “i's” in “Flying Bridge,” which appear to be dotted with dashes. The presence of the pencil underlining and asterisk for “Stern” also indicates a potential other person marking the page as the rest of the drawing is in pen.The consignor of this piece was a member of the post-production team on Jaws, who obtained this piece from the film's editor, Verna Fields, as he was putting together a commemorative cast and crew book of production materials relating to the film. The piece came from a post-production meeting where the attendees were director Steven Spielberg, editor Verna Fields, Spielberg's assistant and editing apprentice Rick Fields (who was also the son of Verna Fields), and assistant editor William Carruth. It had been used in the meeting to help convey the geography of the Orca for the sake of the editing process. It has been unseen in the consignor's personal collection of Jaws production mementos for over 50 years.In researching this piece, Julien's Hollywood Specialists contacted William Carruth and shared the image of the sketch with him. While Mr. Carruth did not remember this exact drawing, he did confirm that there were many meetings during the post-production process on Jaws where the only attendees were Spielberg, Verna Fields, Rick Fields, and himself. When asked if Mr. Carruth recalled who was the most likely to have drawn the sketch out of those four people, he stated that it wasn't him and that he did not recall Verna Fields or Rick Fields ever drawing an image in order to indicate or illustrate something they were trying to communicate. Mr. Carruth did recall that Spielberg was known to draw and doodle throughout the filmmaking process, including a specific time when Spielberg drew a sketch for Mr. Carruth of a specific shot that Spielberg was looking for in the footage of the film. Spielberg's penchant for rough drawings during productions has been documented before, such as in the 1981 special movie magazine, “Raiders of the Lost Ark Collector's Album,” and the 1994 book, “From Star Wars to Indiana Jones: The Best of the Lucasfilm Archives,” both of which contain sketches by Spielberg of various elements for Indiana Jones films.While the exact artist behind this sketch is still unknown, it is still a remarkable and unique document that gives an inside look at part of the filmmaking process of one of the greatest films ever made, making it a rare piece of movie history for a serious Jaws collector.
14 x 8.5 x 0.25 in; 35.56 x 21.59 x 0.64 cm
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