This is the hardest one since Joan Rivers. Richard Kiel aka “Jaws” is deader than Ray Rice’s endorsement deals. What can I say about Richard Kiel? Not a giant fan of James Bond. Huge talent. Big for his age. Richard was 74 & 7’ 2”. His bite was worse than his bark. Though he hated his bark when he played a tree in the play “Marking His Territory.” Richard was not self conscious about his size or his braces. We responded to a ‘size doesn’t matter’ seminar. We met on a cattle call; I was following in his footsteps. We were both reading for the same part. A role that eventually went to a young Shirley Temple, who was deemed not right for the part & replaced by Verne Troyer (who ended up being best known as Mini Me in a spy spoof.) Richard confided he was always confused with Ted Cassidy, who played Lurch on The Addams Family. He was also confused with Andre the Giant. We were all confused, together & alone. Especially me. I was the only one who didn’t share their stature & he’d pick the better parts and apples for me. When we started out, Richard & I shared the same vision. In fact, he was also short-sighted, but over summer vacation, he had a growth spurt & shot up a good four feet! It was around that time, he was supposed to get braces too. He went with the stainless steel cuz he was going thru a ‘metal phase’. He’d heard that fish was good brain food & would eat a great white shark every day for lunch. I dubbed him “Jaws”, which led to one of his first landmark roles. It was a Twilight Zone episode called “To Serve Man” & Richard was an alien man-eater. I got him a few odd jobs, but it was as James Bond’s biggest challenge, “Jaws” that he towered over everybody. It was a love/hate relationship, first in ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’; Jaws resurfaced in ‘Moonraker’ as a failed astronaut. I was a notorious name-dropper & used Dick to get to ‘Pussy Galore.’ Those were the days. I was with him at the end. The shark tank came back to bite him in the ass. His braces rusted & Jaws couldn’t open his mouth. He died in my arms. His last words were “Mmmm rrrrrr fffffffffdd!!!”
Posted on: Mon, 15 Sep 2014 12:56:45 +0000
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