Filming for the hour-long drama about life at a luxury hotel will start in May, with 12 episodes scheduled so far, said the show’s producer, Harry Bring. The pilot completed filming last week.

For now the show is called "O'ahu," but that may be changed to "The North Shore," Bring said.

It’s the first of several dramas being filmed in Hawai'i to commit beyond a pilot show. NBC is filming a police drama called "Hawai'i" — crews filmed a chase through Waikiki on Monday — and WB plans to start filming "Rocky Point" on the North Shore in June.

And an ABC pilot called "Lost" begins filming at remote locations on O'ahu next month.

The last high-profile series to film in the Islands was "Baywatch, Hawai'i," which was cancelled in February 2001 after two years and lackluster reviews.

The new Fox Television drama will air on Mondays starting with the pilot on June 14, Bring said. The summer schedule is unusual. Most series typically begin in late September or early October.

Much of the filming will take place at the Turtle Bay Resort, which will serve as the show’s hotel, Bring said.

"It is about the young people who work here and the guests that arrive and the interaction and who’s in love with whom and who’s backstabbing who," Bring said. "It’s all that stuff rolled into a workplace."

A dozen episodes would take the show to early October and if it’s successful, Fox Television could schedule nine more episodes to complete the season in May 2005.

"O'ahu" is on a "fast-track," Bring said.

"Most shows get two months to prepare," he said. "We’re going to get five weeks. We are on such a fast track we can’t manufacture shows fast enough. We are going to shoot for seven, six months maybe. And if we get another nine episodes, we get a few more months."

The show will star Kristoffer Polaha and Rachel Shelley, Bring said. He expects to use several local actors, but is not sure how many because he does not have scripts yet. A dozen local actors were used in the pilot.

So far, the look has been fantastic.

"It’s beautiful," he said. "The people are great. The weather is great. We wanted to create a show where people would look at it and say 'I want to be there and I want to be talking to that person.’ "

Officials at Fox Television had no comment on the show.

But Hawai'i film officials are excited. Although no dollar amounts have been released for "O'ahu," film officials say that a show that commits to an entire season can spend about $20 million a year in the Islands.

Walea Constantinau, commissioner for the Honolulu Film Office, spoke with Bring yesterday when she started hearing rumors that "O'ahu" had been given the green light.

"We are thrilled," she said. "We’d heard all along that what they were getting was quality stuff that looked fabulous and we had high hopes. But until you get the green light, you never know."