While You Were Sleeping | Bite Size!

Jonny Weston, who's playing Jay Moriarty.

By now you’ve probs heard that a feature film about the life and times of Jay Moriarty is in production. Based in Santa Cruz and, more specifically, at Mavericks, the film stars Jonny Weston as Jay, and Gerry Butler (the adonis from 300) as Jay’s mentor, Rick ‘Frosty’ Hesson. Jay, who died while diving in the Maldives in 2001, became famous in 1995 at age 16 after a Surfer Magazine cover, which showed him hung up in the lip on a Mav’s bomb. He’s still regarded as one of the most talented men to ever surf Mav’s.

As outlined in a recent article by New York Times‘ T Magazine, Hollywood attempts at making surf films have, thus far, been kinda tragic for the most part. But it seems like Of Men and Mavericks has been done right – the boards for the film were all shaped by Bob Pearson, the wetsuits are all O’Neill and the stuntman/water assistance team was made up of Mav’s locals and those who know the wave intimately (though that still didn’t stop Gerry from scooping a two-wave hold-down for his troubles during filming, reportedly.) If you’re down with an interesting read about surfing, written by someone who ain’t attached to the sport and scene, dive over and check out the T Magazine article, here.

From Spartan weapon to Cali guru.