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Jay Mello was only 6 when he was cast as Jean Brody in Jaws
Though he was so young, he remembers that the animatronic sharks used in the movie shared him so much he wouldn’t go into the water fr years after
“I didn’t get to see the whole [movie] because my mom and dad kept ducking my head under the seats,” he says
While he was only 6 years old when he was cast as Sean Brody in Jaws, Jay Mello remembers “everything” about making the film — including the animatronic sharks, which scared him so much he wouldn’t go in the water for years after.
Mello appeared in the 1975 classic as the youngest son of Martin Brody (Roy Scheider), the police chief of Amity Island, a fictional seaside New England town that finds itself plagued by a monstrous Great White shark at the height of tourist season.
“I do remember the first time I saw it,” Mello told PEOPLE of one of the animatronic sharks dreamed up by production designer Joe Alves and cemented in film history. “It was just the head part of the shark. I kind of questioned Shari Rhodes, who was the casting director. I said, ‘Where’s the rest of the shark?’ “
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Jay Mello awaits filming during production of “Jaws” on the island of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, on July 15, 1974.
As Alves explained to PEOPLE, there were actually three sharks — “one that went right to left, one that went left to right and another on a crane that could be tilted.”
“I worked with the marine biologists to get the shark to look exactly like a Great White — but bigger,” he said, adding that he modeled it after a 12-foot shark, but doubled the size to create a 25-foot villain.
And while Alves remembers the animatronic sharks (nicknamed “Bruce” on set) as mere “props,” Mello remembers them much differently — particularly after he first saw them on the big screen.
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“I didn’t go back into the water for like two years after the movie was made,” he told PEOPLE, recounting how his parents forced him to duck his head during the most terrifying parts of the movie.
“It was strange to see myself on screen,” he added, admitting, “I didn’t get to see the whole thing because my mom and dad kept ducking my head under the seats.”
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American actor Roy Scheider on the set of Jaws
The first time he saw the scene in which local fisherman Ben Gardner’s head is found in a wrecked boat — making Gardner the shark’s third victim — wasn’t until years later.
“That kind of haunts me,” he said with a laugh.
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Mello got the role in a roundabout way, after his mom brought him to an open casting call with the intention of having his older brothers audition. But it was young Jay who caught director Steven Spielberg’s attention.
“My older brothers Tom and John were actually the ones auditioning,” Mello told PEOPLE. “I had a habit of copying people. So when Steven Spielberg was interviewing them, I was copying him as he gave direction. When the interview was over, he said, ‘You boys can go, we’re done. But the youngest can stay.’ “
While the first film was shot on location in Martha’s Vineyard in 1974, near Mello’s childhood home, the latter versions were filmed elsewhere, and Mello abandoned the role to focus on a normal childhood.
His character, however, remained a part of the franchise — and was ultimately killed off (in a shark attack, naturally) in 1987’s Jaws: The Revenge.
Read the original article on People
