7 Things You Didn’t Know About Richard Kiel, Jaws From James Bond
Even if you don’t know Richard Kiel by name, you know him by his face — or perhaps by his height, which was a staggering 7’2″. Though the hulking actor will always be best remembered as the steel-toothed Bond villain Jaws from The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker, his deep voice and deadpan comedic timing helped him steal the show as a not-so-tough tough guy in The Longest Yard, and as Happy Gilmore‘s former boss who has a supportive attitude and a nail through his head.
Kiel, who died on September 10, 2014, had a career that spanned nearly 50 years, taking him from early TV Westerns to the 2010 Disney cartoon Tangled. Along the way, he was almost the Incredible Hulk, starred in one of the most famous sci-fi TV episodes of all time, and, no joke, worked as a cemetery plot salesman.
>> All the actors who played James Bond
1A Hormonal Disorder Made Him Incredibly Tall
Everett Collection
Kiel’s unique look, including his height, deep voice, large hands, and prominent jaw, weren’t just the result of random luck. Kiel had a hormonal disorder called acromegaly, in which the body releases excess growth hormone throughout a person’s life. Another actor who had acromegaly? Ted Cassidy, who played Lurch on The Addams Family.
Kiel’s size was obviously a career asset, but it had some drawbacks, too. In a 1985 Late Show with David Letterman interview, he admitted that he struggled to fit inside airplane bathrooms. And in a 2009 interview, he revealed that because his jaw was so large, he needed to get novocaine half an hour before his dental appointment, to give it time to properly spread through his mouth. His wife of 40 years, Diane, was a comparatively miniature 5’1″, but they made it work: “We see eye to eye on so many things,” the couple were known to quip.
2He Had A Lot of Odd Jobs
Gabe Ginsberg/FilmMagic
Before he became an instantly recognizable character actor, Kiel had jobs. A lot of jobs. Kiel worked as a door-to-door vacuum salesman (“I would knock on the roof,” he joked to Letterman), a cemetery plot salesman, and a bouncer at a bar called the Rag Doll.
Those last two jobs, however, proved to be great training for his later gigs in front of the camera. As he recalled in a 2009 interview with Den of Geek, cemetery plot sales helped him learn how to work with a script, and bouncing gave him acting practice: “Instead of trying to be mean and tough, I’d be jovial and crazy and I would go [cue crazy, loud, slightly unnerving laugh whilst speaking], ‘Now you don’t want any trouble do you?’ And they sobered up real quick… They didn’t really want me hurting people, so it was more acting and I scared them into sobering up.”
That last job also provided him with a more concrete in to the acting world: a bar patron worked at NBC, and invited Kiel in to audition for a role on the TV show Klondike.
3He Appeared in One of the Most Famous Twilight Zone Episodes of All Time
After his appearance in Klondike, Kiel began to get regular TV work, showing up in The Rifleman, Gilligan’s Island, The Monkees, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and multiple episodes of The Wild, Wild West. But his most memorable TV role came early in his career… and involved a giant prosthetic forehead
The season three The Twilight Zone episode “To Serve Man” is one of the series’ best, excellently epitomizing the show’s deft way with social criticism and twist endings. A young Kiel, in one of his first acting jobs, played the giant-skulled alien who would love to serve man (with a sprig of parsley and some mashed potatoes).
4It Was His Idea to Make Jaws a Little More Complicated
Kiel appeared in a number of ’60s B-movies, including The Phantom Planet and a caveman movie called Eegah. But his film career didn’t truly begin until he appeared in the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me, as the metal-mouthed villain Jaws.
Bond’s producers discovered Kiel from his appearance on the William Shatner series Barbary Coast. But he was able to land the role by suggesting that Jaws have a little more to him than, you know, those jaws. After the producers mostly emphasized Jaws’ physical strength and revealed that they had met with some non-actors for the role, Kiel argued that the character should be played with a bit of depth: “Whomever you cast, whether it’s me or somebody else, I think it needs to be an actor because a character who kills people with his teeth could become over the top quite easily. If I were to play the role, I’d give him some human characteristics; perseverance, frustration, those kind of things.”
The Spy Who Loved Me, Roger Moore, Richard Kiel, 1977. Courtesy Everett Collection
Kiel then stole the show in two Bond movies: The Spy Who Loved Me and 1979’s Moonraker, where Jaws experiences a change of heart after finding love with a diminutive girlfriend. “We didn’t plan to make Jaws lovable. It just sort of evolved that way while we were shooting,” Kiel told Canadian newspaper The Star-Phoenix in 1979.
Jaws was so popular with fans that there was initially talk about bringing him back for a third film, For Your Eyes Only, where he would marry Dolly, his petite girlfriend, but the plan was eventually nixed.
Jaws did come back one more time … for a split second in a 1996 Bond-themed Pepsi commercial.
5The Jaws Teeth Were Incredibly Uncomfortable
Everett Collection
Kiel’s signature dentures were made of acrylic, not steel, but that didn’t make them any more comfortable. The actor could only wear them for about a minute at a time before he started gagging and they had to be removed. “They were nauseating,” he told The Guardian in 2009. “They were up in the roof of your mouth and gave you a gagging effect — you felt like you were going to be sick. It did add to the stoic part of my character — to keep from throwing up.”
The first set of Jaws teeth were designed by acclaimed makeup and prosthesis artist John Chambers, who, among other things, created Spock’s ears. But Bond producer Cubby Broccoli didn’t like the Chambers-designed chompers, so he recruited a local dentist to design the finished product you see in the film.
6Jaws Was Also in ‘Silver Streak’… Kind Of
In the 1976 Gene Wilder/ Richard Pryor comedy Silver Streak, Kiel plays a Bond-style evil henchman named Reace, who flashes metal teeth — an obvious homage to Jaws. Except The Spy Who Loved Me wasn’t released until 1977, seven months after Silver Streak. Since the Bond film took the better part of a year to shoot, it’s been suggested that Kiel wore the metal teeth in that film first, but that Silver Streak simply ended up being released sooner.
7He Was Almost the Incredible Hulk
Universal Television/Courtesy: Everett Collection
Kiel had been blind in one eye since birth, a condition that normally didn’t limit his ability to act… until he got a gig playing the Incredible Hulk. Kiel had been contracted to play the Hulk in a series of TV movies that were hoped to be picked up to series. However, the contacts that the Hulk wore irritated his one good eye, leaving his vision clouded for hours afterwards. “Not to mention the green makeup getting all over the white interior of my car and the bathtub and the sheets on the bed,” he told Den of Geek in 2009. Kiel regretted signing up for the role, and then felt guilty about it, since the cast and crew desperately hoped it would become a regular TV show. Luckily for him, Marvel had a change of heart, and decided to go with the more muscular Lou Ferrigno. Ferrigno got to spend four seasons as the Hulk and Kiel got paid for his two TV movies anyway — a great outcome for all.
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