Just finished a quick yet poignant documentation of what remains of the Hawaiian Hut, with the Professional Eye of Mr Eye-zoom-eye as the Recordisto and yr obdnt srvnt as Ariadno guiding Mr E-Z-E into the various coves and caves of the Labyrinth. The Hawaiian Hut, of course, is the natural habitat of the quintessential Don Tiki show, and it is definitely endangered. If memory serves, weʻve done at least 6 shows there, documented throughout our video archives, such as (natch) Live At The Hawaiian Hut on our video page.
Itʻs been over a year since the HHʻs doors closed to paying audiences, abandoning honoluluʻs longest-running polynesian show in the process. We affectionately referred to it as The Zombie Luʻau for two compelling reasons. First, the just-off-jet Japanese tourists, tourbussed into the showroom before checking in or even decompressing, invariably streamed out post-show with a pronounced collective zomboid expression and manner. Second, the show itself acted as a wonderful soporific, complete with speechlines written circa 1971 and repeated verbatim for onto 4 decades. Moreover, for some odd reason the lighting crew wielded an array of colored footlights to the exclusion of other lighting on, one might say, a bit too many numbers. You could also make a case for Reason #2 instrumental in the rendering of Reason #1, thus making the show a perfect storm, as it were, of mass audience brainfreeze.
Be that as it may, we enjoyed many high-spirited moments there, and wish to keep it going somehow. Latest scheme is to sell it to Chinese investors, reasoning that since they make everything, they have all the money, and indeed they own our money. In this endeavor, I feel like Iʻm somehow party to one of Ralph Kramden and Ed Nortonʻs get-rich-quick schemes. My only hope is that the Chinese investors never saw The Honeymooners.
Hence the documentation, in video and pic form. Ammunition for the scheme. Mr E-Z-E will soon make the shoot available to us to post in all our RSS avatars -- The Hawaiian Hut, in all its splendor and all its current incipient decrepitude.
Perry