I set out to answer the comment made to my last entry with a comment of my own. But as I am wont to do, a short response morphed into bloviation and by the third or fourth paragraph I decided it was better as an entry.

If you haven’t already catch up with the preceding entry and join me in my answer to Heidi. (I promise, there is some wheat to sift from the chaff.)

Heidi-
Interesting comment and probably one that would take multiple entries to answer. The main concern I had when I wrote the entry you prove somewhat by being a UH Theatre grad living on the mainland. UH graduates students and they have no option to ply their craft but to leave or find a job in another industry and rehearse for Diamond Head and Manoa Valley at night.

That might be why the quality is so good–a large pool of well trained actors who didn’t leave when they graduated. I just feel bad that there isn’t even one company in the state with which dancers and actors can aspire to perform and be forced to go elsewhere because it is so difficult to break in to the company. Classically trained musicians at least have the symphony to gaze longingly at.

As for combating local perceptions. I think the solution differs from community to community. For example, what is the real scale by which shows are measured in Hawaii?– Las Vegas. For those who have always wondered where people in paradise go on vacation, it is Vegas. Before the recent inter-island airfare wars, it was often cheaper to vacation in Vegas than on a Neighbor Island. So many Hawaiians visit and live there that local cable shows are rebroadcast in Las Vegas.

Las Vegas definitely sets a standard much the same as Broadway sets the standard in other places. One of the tourist focused shows in Waikiki is Cirque Hawaii unabashedly modeled after Cirque de Soleil. I neglected to mention it in my post because honestly, I didn’t know it was an on going concern. I thought it was just an event that happened this past winter because I have heard no mention if it since. (I am guessing they focusing marketing on tourists.) On Maui there is a Cirque inspired show as well, ‘Ulalena. It has more of a local feel though because it employs Hawaiian dress and chant. (Don’t know if you were around when it started.)

But getting back to the question of how does one combat local perceptions that such fine work is par for the course. Ultimately, I am not sure you can or if is imperative to do so. If people are lucky enough to get good quality stuff cheaply and the volunteers are willing to invest the time and energy to maintain the high quality over the years, then the folks in that community are damned lucky. That is the power of the arts made manifest right there.

While I have certainly seen better than what Diamond Head, Manoa Valley and Army Community Theatre have produced, I don’t necessarily think there needs to be an Equity acting company or full time professional dance company (other than the hula hālau) for the sole purpose of bringing a higher quality product to the state. I am just really surprised that nothing has sprung up given the available opportunities. Though, as I mentioned I think the lack means the state exports creative minds and provides no incentive for such people to migrate in.

Ultimately I think it comes down to the value a community places on the experience. One of two episodes of Little House on the Prairie I remember from when I was a kid featured Pa making furniture by hand for the shop in town. The problem was, the shop owner could sell factory made furniture cheaper and the factory could make them fast enough to keep up with demand. He acknowledged that Pa’s chairs were much better than the factory ones but customers found the factory ones suitable for their needs and didn’t need such well-made chairs.

If people find the community theatre performances suitable to their needs because they lack the experience to discern between the quality of that performance and one at the local regional theatre, (or don’t think the disparity is great enough to pay more for the difference if they do perceive it), then the only option is to appeal to them with other criteria than performance quality.

In some respects, we should be happy that people are attending and participating in community theatre at all. My Little House example could as easily be applied to community theatre vs. DVD/Internet/movie/cable. This is not to say we should content ourselves with the successes of community theatres and count our blessings. We should always be raising the bar of expectations in every endeavor be it entertainment or education, (and if I may wax a little political, fuel efficiency and energy production.)

So I was sort of hedging my bets when I made the vague statement a couple days ago that the Honolulu Symphony was the largest professional performing arts organization in the state. Turns out my suspicions were correct and the symphony is, with a minor exception, the only professional performing arts organization in the state in terms of paid artists.

The one exception is Honolulu Theatre for Youth whose small company of actors heroicly stagger along supplementing little pay with night jobs. (Since most of the performances are school matinees.)

As poorly paid as the symphony musicians are, it is even worse for actors and dancers. In truth, it may be easier to make a living wage as a non-classical musician, visual artist (depending on medium), or luau performer than any other type of artist.

It may come as a suprise to people to think that Hawaii which has enjoyed record numbers of tourists (7.6 million last year, 7.5 year before) doesn’t have a strong entertainment industry. People can’t spend ALL their time on the beach and shopping after all, right?

It is true though. In terms of theatres you have the university based student theatres and amateur groups. A couple theatres have full time administration and production staffs but I don’t even know if there are any guest artists even performing under Actors Equity letters of agreement. (There has been a spate of news personalities performing in lead roles lately though.) The actors getting the most work are the ones on Lost and most of the regulars aren’t local performers.

The operas and ballets are the same. They bring in paid guest artists, but the chorus and corps are comprised of volunteers or students. A couple modern dance companies pay dancers a token on a show by show basis to acknowledge their talent and contribution but don’t maintain any sort of paid company.

There are a handful of presenting houses and bar/club venues of note and that is about it for live performance in the state.

There are certainly a fair number of things to do for people to be sure. But now that I have started to settle in to my position and have an opportunity to assess my surroundings, I have begun to wonder why there are no other professional performance entities other than the luaus organized to take advantage of the tourism and employing local performers full time.

The IATSE unions employ a fair number of people in some of the presenting houses (and on the Lost series) and there seems to be money to pay us evil administrators. Why aren’t the performers getting their due I wonder.

I am going to have to look into this a bit while I am not terribly busy this summer.