Patrick Jankiewicz has not only proven himself a true Jaws fanatic by writing the Jaws compendium, Just When You Thought It Was Safe, but also drove cross country to attend Jaws Fest way back when.
(And don’t forget, the 36th anniversary of Jaws is on June 20.)
“I hadn’t decided to do it until about three days before it happened,” says Jankiewicz. “My brother Don and I drove cross-country and arrived in Martha’s Vineyard on the day of the event. Setting foot onto Martha’s Vineyard with all of the signs from the movie up was like walking around Amity Island. Many of the people in the movies were there, and it was fun to see the sites without the TBS logo in the corner.”
Steven Spielberg was going to attend the event, but he got caught up in finishing War of the Worlds, and prepping Munich, but he did send a video message: “I think it’s amazing the shelf life this film has had, and that’s only because fans like yourselves have kept this film alive and [in] people’s consciousness and only have to thank you for that.”
Jaws was a tough shoot, and production designer Joe Alves remarked, “Last time we were here, we couldn’t wait to get off this island!” Susan Backline, the nude swimmer in the beginning of the film who is the first victim of the shark, also gave the buoy she clung to a hug, the first time she saw the buoy since the shoot.
Jankiewicz’s follow up to Just When You Thought It Was Safe is You Wouldn’t Like Me When I’m Angry, which is his companion for the Hulk series, which will come out this month via BearManor Media.
“In a summer when marvel is expected to rake in over a billion dollars with Captatin America, X Men: First Class and Thor, it’s important to remember that The Incredible Hulk was Marvel’s first live-action success, the longest running comic book-based show until Smallville broke its five year record,” Jankiewicz explains.
“The book covers how they made a transformation scene work without modern technology, how a cheerful deaf bodybuilder became an unlikely TV star and how, by the end of the series, Bill Bixby’s life actually resembled his title character in tragic ways.”
