Kumu Kahua schedules

By Wayne Harada
Advertiser Entertainment Editor

Kumu Kahua Theatre's new stage season, beginning in September, is highlighted by four premieres, all by Hawai'i writers. Among the new works is a comedy by Lee Cataluna.

Thus, the five-production season fulfills Kumu Kahua's mission of being the local theater group committed to producing plays about life in Hawai'i, plays by Hawai'i playwrights, and plays of Hawai'i's people.

The shows will be at Kumu Kahua's 100-seat playhouse, at 46 Merchant St.

The schedule:

• "A Language of Their Own," Sept. 6 through Oct. 7. A play by Chay Yew, about two gay Asian-American men, Oscar and Ming, who seem made for each other. Conflicts arise when Oscar tests positive for HIV, creating hardship in the relationship. Transcends the boundaries of a "gay play" because of its universal view of love, sexuality, personal identity and more. Chay Yew is director of the Asian Theatre Workshop at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles and artistic director of the Northwest Asian American Theatre/The Black Box in Seattle.
• "Olo Ka Lau," Nov. 8 through Dec. 9. A drama by Kimo Armitage, about two brothers caught in a dilemma of how to treat a disease; one is reluctant to learn from his roots, including Hawaiian chants and healing rituals, the other an eager student of modern ways faced with an illness that medicine cannot cure. The play is the winner of the 1997 Kumu Kahua/University of Hawai'i Theatre Department Playwriting Contest.
• "To the Last Hawaiian Soldier," Jan. 10 through Feb. 10. A drama by Sean T.C. O'Malley, with parallel story lines, juxtaposing a tale of 19th-century Robert Wilcox, King David Kalakaua and his sister Queen Lili'uokalani in the days before the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy, with a contemporary story about a young Hawaiian man, frustrated by a lack of progress in the sovereignty movement, who is driven to an act of terrorism. The play explores the perennial problem of resorting to violence as a means of achieving idealistic ends.
• "A Ricepaper Airplane," March 14 through April 14. Gary Pak's novel has been adapted for the stage by John Wat and Keith Kashiwada. It deals with Kim Sung Wha, a dying man drifting in and out of consciousness, segueing from the Hawai'i sugar plantation where he worked to his Korean homeland from a century ago. A heroic tale of loss, love and rebirth.
• "Super Secret," May 16 through June 16. Lee Cataluna's latest comedy, commissioned by Kumu Kahua, focuses on five University of Hawai'i undergraduates who question the deeds of clueless bureaucrats and take matters in their own hands, with comic results.

Curtain times: 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays.

Season tickets: $50 for renewals, $60 for new subscribers.

Single tickets: $15 ($10 for students); $10 rate at Thursday shows for unemployed.

Reservations: 536-4222.