Shaw was nominated for an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for his role as Henry VIII in the drama film A Man for All Seasons (1966).

His other film roles included the mobster Doyle Lonnegan in The Sting (1973) and the shark hunter Quint in Jaws (1975).

He also played roles in From Russia with Love (1963), Battle of Britain (1969), Young Winston (1972), The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974), Robin and Marian (1976), and Black Sunday and The Deep, both of which were released in 1977.

His father, a doctor and former Royal Field Artillery Lieutenant, was of Scottish descent; his mother, a former nurse, was born at Piggs Peak, Swaziland.

[4] For a brief period, he was a teacher at Glenhow Preparatory School in Saltburn-by-the-Sea in the North Riding of Yorkshire, before attending the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, graduating in 1948.

In 1947, he appeared in The Cherry Orchard on British TV; also for that medium, he performed scenes from Twelfth Night and Macbeth.

[8] Shaw had small roles in Sea Fury (1958) and Libel (1959) and guest-starred on William Tell, ITV Television Playhouse, The Four Just Men, and Danger Man.

In 1961, he appeared in a Broadway production of Harold Pinter's The Caretaker alongside Donald Pleasence and Alan Bates.

He, Pleasence, and Bates reprised their performances in a film version of The Caretaker (1963); Shaw was part of the consortium who helped finance the latter.

For TV he adapted and appeared in a production of A Florentine Tragedy (1963), and was Claudius in Hamlet at Elsinore (1964) with Christopher Plummer.

He played the title role in The Luck of Ginger Coffey (1964), shot in Canada alongside Mary Ure, who became his second wife.

Shaw was the relentless Wehrmacht panzer commander Colonel Hessler in Battle of the Bulge (1965), produced by Philip Yordan; a young Henry VIII in A Man for All Seasons (1966), which earned him a nomination for the Golden Globe Award and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor; General George Armstrong Custer in Custer of the West (1967), again for Yordan;[14] Martin Luther in Luther (a 1968 film made for television); he was top billed in another film version of Pinter's The Birthday Party (1968), directed by William Friedkin.

[21] As an actor he appeared in A Town Called Bastard (1971), a spaghetti Western; Young Winston (1972), as Lord Randolph Churchill; A Reflection of Fear (1972); The Hireling (1973); he had a cameo in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973); played mobster Doyle Lonnegan in The Sting (1973), a huge hit; was the subway-hijacker and hostage-taker "Mr. Blue" in The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974).

The Man in the Glass Booth was further developed for the screen, but Shaw disapproved of the resulting screenplay and had his name removed from the credits.

He did not like the idea and indeed, if you will watch the film, you will see that his name does not appear in the credits, nor does it even say, "based on the play, The Man in the Glass Booth" because he wouldn't let us do it.

[17] Shaw achieved his greatest film stardom after playing the shark-obsessed fisherman Quint in Jaws (1975), although he was at first reluctant to take the role since he did not like the book, but decided to accept at the urging of both his wife, actress Mary Ure, and his secretary: "The last time they were that enthusiastic was From Russia with Love.

"[23] Shaw then appeared in End of the Game (1975); Diamonds (1975), because "I wanted to play a wonderfully elegant Englishman";[6] Robin and Marian (1976) as the Sheriff of Nottingham opposite Audrey Hepburn (Maid Marian) and Sean Connery (Robin Hood); Swashbuckler (1976); playing the lighthouse keeper and treasure-hunter Romer Treece in The Deep (1977), for which his fee was $650,000;[24] and as Israeli Mossad agent David Kabakov in Black Sunday (1977).

"[33] Shaw died in Ireland at the age of 51 from a heart attack on 28 August 1978, while driving from Castlebar, County Mayo, to his home in Tourmakeady.

[40] Film director Ridley Scott, in the DVD commentary for Gladiator (2000) when discussing the casting of Próximo and Marcus Aurelius, said "We have very few Robert Shaws now",[41] implying he had wanted to cast a certain type of rugged actor that Shaw typified, in this case Oliver Reed and Richard Harris.

At the 39th Academy Awards in 1967, Shaw became the second actor – after Charles Laughton – to receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Henry VIII of England, in the film A Man for All Seasons (1966).