Posted on: Friday, May 11, 2001
Music Scene
Impressive launch for SOS Vegas spinoff
By Wayne Harada
Advertiser Entertainment Editor
With energy to spare and remarkable grace, the Society of Seven Las Vegas launched a milestone engagement Tuesday night at the Outrigger Waikiki's Main Showroom.
Talk about making a great impression: The SOS LV built on and expanded the legacy of its mentors, the original Society of Seven Honolulu, by filling those proverbial large shoes with aplomb, assurance and fidelity.
The new act is filling in while the senior group travels, with additional Outrigger dates possible; an eventual anchor at a Las Vegas hotel is the ultimate destination.
This is no mere knockoff of a Waikiki staple for 31 years. The new group — Johnny Fernandez, Glenn Miyashiro, Freddy Von Paraz, Richard Natto, Jonathan Kaina, John Salvatera and Jan Luna — has taken a foundation and built upon it, replicating centerpieces such as the SOS' trademark Broadway tributes ("The Lion King," "The Phantom of the Opera") but adding a personal stamp of inventiveness along the way. This is familiar turf with engaging new elements, particularly in a lengthy but revealing segment of celebrity impressions.
The sequence began with Luna — a Terry Lucido look-alike, to those who remember the original original — strumming 'ukulele while singing a tribute to Bruddah Iz via "Over the Rainbow." The impressions are intended to signify influences in all our lives, with a fresh parade of characterizations: Fernandez doing Pee Wee Herman, Von Paraz mimicking Elmo, Natto impersonating Kermit the Frog, Luna squealing as Miss Piggy, Salvatera making like the Tasmanian Devil, Kaina enacting Bullwinkle, and so on.
Outside the cartoon characters, however, is where the SOS LV develops its own soul. Fernandez, with requisite single glove, gyrated and moonwalked as Michael Jackson ("Billie Jean"); Salvatera, with braids and sunglasses, depicted a "little" Stevie Wonder ("I Just Called To Say I Love You"), Kaina bounced and boogied as James Brown ("I Feel Good"), Natto jammed and pranced as Chuck Berry ("Johnny B. Goode"), Salvatera and Miyashiro struck a coosome twosome pose as Sonny and Cher ("I Got You, Babe"). In a tribute to Gary Bautista, the kingpin of SOS impressions, Fernandez borrowed the gimmick of the split-faced dual personalities of Carol Channing and Louis Armstrong ("Hello, Dolly").
With its more youthful orientation, the SOS LV goes one up on the original guys with a dazzling and expressive salute to 'N Sync, via "This I Promise You" and "Bye Bye Bye."
In a flashback laced with both humor and poignancy, Miyashiro, Luna and Fernandez brought back a classic SOS moment, the imaginary strip tease cha-cha, with paper shielding vital parts. Luna, who looks eerily like the late Lucido, made the moment particularly touching, even generating tears of joy. It's this moment that made it very clear that the SOS has come full cycle, a pioneering ensemble then and now.
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| SOS Las Vegas does 'N Sync: from left, John Salvatera, Jonathan Kaina, Johnny Fernandez, Glenn Miyashiro, Freddy Von Paraz.
• Society of Seven Las Vegas |
