This Day in Pop Culture for June 20

1975: ‘Jaws’ is Released in Theaters

Universal Pictures producers of the film Jaws hired 27-year-old Steven Spielberg to direct the film before the release of his first movie, The Sugarland Express.

Based on the novel by Peter Benchley, shooting the film took longer than expected and drove costs up to $8 million while the budget was set at $4 million. At one point, Universal threatened to shut down production of the movie, but had a change of heart and instead promoted with a $700,000 marketing campaign.

The mechanical shark used in the picture was affectionately named Bruce. (Pixar named the shark in Finding Nemo after him as well.) The famous “daa-daa” music was composed by John Williams and was performed by tuba player Tommy Johnson.

Jaws made about $7 million during the opening weekend becoming one of the first summer blockbuster films ever. It also caused a lot of people to be afraid of going into the water. Any water. (Image: Universal)

2019: ‘Holey Moley’ Premieres

Holey Moley was a sports reality competition series where the term “sports” was loosely termed. It is often pitched that the series was created by Stephen Curry, but outside of his occasional appearances on the show, he is just one of the eight or so executive producers.

Wearing the famed gold Wide World of Sports jackets, the show is hosted by sports commentator Joe Tessitore and comedian Rob Riggle with Jeannie Mai as a sideline reporter. They really made this wacky show worth watching.

Holey Moley was filmed at Sable Ranch in Santa Clarita, California – the same place where Wipeout was filmed years earlier. The obstacles were built by the ATS Team who have done work on other shows like American Ninja Warrior, The Titan Games and Big Brother.

Holey Moley ended its run in 2022 after four seasons. Hopefully it will come back some day.

1863: West Virginia Becomes the 35th U.S. State

1997: The Movie That Killed Batman

Although not a huge hit with fans, Warner Bros. was happy with director Joel Schumacher’s light and bright approach to 1995’s Batman Forever and they wanted a repeat performance for fourth film, Batman and Robin. However, the studio told him that they wanted the movie to be more toyetic. Maybe that was a mistake.

Val Kilmer declined to play the Caped Crusader one more time, so George Clooney took his place however Chris O’Donnell was game to play Robin again. The film also starred Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze, Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy and Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl.

When Batman and Robin opened on this day, it became the third-highest opening weekend gross of 1997, but ticket sales declined by 63% the next week. Audiences did not like this movie. Neither did the critics. It holds a score of 11% on Rotten Tomatoes. It has been considered as one of the worst comic book superhero movies ever made and was nominated for 11 Golden Raspberry awards with Silverstone winning for Worst Supporting Actress. And nobody was a fan that Batman’s and Robin’s costumes featured nipples. Needless to say, the next planned movie, Batman Unchained, was cancelled.

Screenwriter Akiva Goldsman has said, “We didn’t mean for it to be bad” and Schumacher has gone on to say, “A lot of it was my choice. No one is responsible for my mistakes but me.” Clooney not only apologized to fans, but also to Adam West, who starred in the 1966 TV series. He admits that he didn’t do the character justice and regrets making the movie.

For their part, however, both Schwarzenegger and Thurman said that they enjoyed making the film.