What Theatre Should Be — SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE PAHALA THEATRE at KKT

“The dramatist who is not a poet is only half a dramatist”—John Howard Lawson, Theory and Technique of Playwriting (298)

In other words, plot can only get you halfway. The language of a play must—in order for the work to transcend the obvious, the mundane, the predictable, the banal—be poetry. A poem is not a play, but put the right collection of poems in the right hands and—voila! You have the most exciting and engaging production I’ve seen in any theatre, anywhere, ever. Seriously, it’s that good (in my limited experience and humble opinion).

Saturday Night at the Pāhala Theatre is an award-winning collection of poems by local author and educator Lois-Ann Yamanaka. Director Harry Wong III and his team have fashioned the book into a play, rearranging some things while keeping the integrity of the original work firmly intact. Individual poems become scenes, and though the “narrative” is fragmented, the overall effect is a testament to the quality of its parts. The scenes range from devastating to hilarious and everything in between. In fact, some are devastating and hilarious at the same time. The movement from scene to scene is fluid, so that the mind, continually engaged, needn’t stop to ask why this direction or that. Patterns eventually emerge; the surprises never cease. 

With the absolute barrage of conventional chronological storytelling employed in the creation of so many TV shows and movies, I often wonder if that can really be what we go to the theatre for—to see more of the same. After experiencing Pāhala, I have my answer.

The play is successful on multiple levels. It is simultaneously the story of a place, a generation, a family, and a girl. The girl is actually a compilation of a few different characters from the poems, and so her story is broad, but not without specifics. And anyway, what cements the different elements into one living, breathing human being is the outstanding performance of Elexis Draine. 

Whether Lucy or Asi or Faso, Draine lifts the words off the page with a tongue and a face and a body as sensitive and brave as the woman who penned the poems in the first place. Draine’s character, who’s often seen with a notebook and pencil, narrates the majority of the play, with other characters jumping in to take certain lines, creating scenes portrayed from both the inside and outside. She switches constantly throughout the show from storyteller to an in-the-moment participant in the action and back, displaying dramatic emotional differences from moment to moment and scene to scene with astonishing honesty and depth. Watching Draine, I felt I could look into her eyes and see Yamanaka’s artistic soul.

The rest of the actors, six women and two men, play a range of characters somehow relating to Draine’s character—let’s just call her Lucy, since that character is the most fleshed out. All the other girls are part of the Tita Ensemble—basically a chorus of Lucy’s insecurities, but also much more than that. The Tita Ensemble gives voice to a generation in a particular place in time—coming-of-age Pāhala girls in the 70s. They come and go throughout the play, always amping up the energy with their group tirades, ranging from boys to sex to body image to who loaned who what and who didn’t give shit back—for this last one, the titas take it to the audience in a big way providing one of the most…invigorating parts of the show.

Family is another part of the story. Lucy’s sisters (Danielle Zalopany and Maila P. Rondero) and Mama (Stephanie Keiko Kong) provide the home, though it’s not necessarily the safe haven a child wants home to be. Kong’s portrayal of a mother who enters and states, “I fuckin’ hate kids,” but who also makes her three daughters long-haired yarn wigs so other kids won’t make fun of their boy haircuts (that she gave them) captures a character all too familiar—a mother who maybe had kids too young, who never got to fully enjoy her own youth. In one of the most affecting scenes of the show, Lucy numbers off body parts and Kong responds with a monologue-length scolding for each shameful thing her daughter has done, each more unforgivable (in Mama’s mind) than the last.

Alvin Chan and Shawn Anthony Thomsen cover the various male roles (and a few animals), morphing physically and vocally as necessary. Thomsen produces a range of dynamic characters, from the kind old man with the taxidermy shop to the high-school senior anxious to deflower a young girl—not to mention Aunty Alice and Goat—all with great success. His portrayals prompted more than one round of applause mid-performance.

Chan is especially beguiling with his empathetic portrayal of Willy Joe, the nineteen-year-old high-school dropout dating twelve-year-old Lucy. Their affair is the emotional center of the show, with Chan and Draine upsetting all that we think we should feel about such a match.

Rondero and Moanililia Miller each have strong performances as Lucy’s friends Kala and Girlie. Rondero’s Kala has her own storyline and is equally effective at eliciting laughs and wincing grimaces with her dead-on delivery. Miller has a critical scene at the end, taking over the role of narrator. Lauren Ballesteros and Kelli Pagan complete the ensemble.

Though I can’t feasibly detail each actor’s performance, everybody in this show had it going on. The energy passed ceaselessly from one to the next—Draine’s Lucy at the center with her pencil and notebook, each character a scribbled life lifted from its pages.

Chan also designed the costumes, which are fun and fabulous, not to mention Friston Ho‘okano’s super seventies styled wigs. Daniel Sakimura’s lighting design works wonders with Justin Fragiao’s subtly evocative set. My one gripe: from where I sat in the third row, I had trouble seeing much of the action. Center stage is ground level, with characters often sitting, and unless you’re in the front row or somewhere above the third row, you just can’t see over the people to the “stage.” I was craning and shifting constantly.

Saturday Night at the Pāhala Theatre is what theatre should be. Alive. Relevant. Fearless. Fierce. Emotional. Poetic. You will laugh. You might cry. Your senses will be engaged. Images and words will linger long after the last poem evaporates from the stage. And that last poem—pay attention to it. It’s a significant choice as an ending for the show. A final scene that speaks volumes.

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