He was Spielberg's first choice to play Quint, but Marvin turned it down saying he was going "to be busy fishing".. lol.. Second choice was Sterling Hayden, who I am not familiar with, but was a fisherman.. Can't remember why he didn't play Quint..
Yeah Shaw was brilliant.. I don't recall even one scene where he wasn't believable in the role.. He was credited with writing the Indianapolis speech, although other writers were responsible for it's inception.. I think I've mentioned that he did the first take STONE DRUNK.. next day he thought he could do better doing the second half - the first half while drunk was one of the greatest cinema speeches ever, imo.. So, he did the second half sober.. Its pretty easy to tell as his eyes were watery and he had a tenny tiny slur in his speech - then his eyes cleared up and he spoke more normal on the second half.... You can tell where they spliced it because they shift to a shot of Brody and you hear a tapping on the table.. then they go back to Quint and he's tapping on the table.. I think they did that to make the spliced in second take more of a smooth transition.. at 3:04 in this clip..
Friendship is like peeing your pants.. Everybody can see it, but only you can feel the warmth..