AFTER DEADLINE
Hula festival coverage begins well in advance

By Anne Harpham

In a couple of days, Advertiser assistant features editor Wanda Adams and Advertiser photographer Rebecca Breyer will fly to Hilo to cover the annual Merrie Monarch Festival.

They get to immerse themselves in Hawai'i's premier hula festival with all of its color, music, flowers, personalities and hula competition.

It's fun and rewarding to write about and photograph an event the state will be buzzing about, and they get to attend a festival most of us have to content ourselves with watching on TV.

But just as there are months of work in advance by festival organizers and halau, Adams and Breyer begin preparing well ahead.

For Adams, it starts in the fall. That's when she makes the first calls to Merrie Monarch headquarters to find out how many halau are participating, which judges are changing, which halau are taking a break or coming back to competition, whether there are any new halau, and whether ticket prices are changing.

Just after Christmas, she begins talking to people in the hula community about what to expect at the upcoming festival. Who are the Miss Aloha Hula competitors? Who are the new kumu hula? What are the interesting stories behind the scenes? Out of those conversations, she may write advance stories, or she may keep the material to weave into her stories during the competition.

For Adams and Breyer, coverage officially begins Wednesday when they get a phone line installed so they can file stories and photos.

Adams needs to soak up all the information and capture the atmosphere in the days leading up to the competition. "The kumu hula — though always gracious when you're able to track them down — generally don't seek press coverage," says Adams. "Many do not wish there to be any advance discussion of the mele they've chosen, the adornments the halau will wear, the choreography they've developed. For some, this is a cultural preference, it being inappropriate to talk about these things until they come to pass. For others, it's a competitive issue — wanting to come to the audience fresh, with no preconceived notions in anyone's mind."

We understand why the kumu hula don't want the publicity, but we also know readers are interested in the background, the details, the color. So we gather what we can report without being intrusive.

While halau are in rehearsal, Adams also has to prepare material in advance for the news desk back in Honolulu. She types up names of participants, making sure they are spelled correctly (including kahako and 'okina), and then double- and triple-checks names. Those are all stored in the newsroom's computer system so that the news desk has the information it needs on deadline for photo captions and checking copy.

After all that preparation, Merrie Monarch week is, says Adams, "hula, hula, hula: rehearsals by day, performance for four or five hours every night, note-taking, people-watching, grabbing interviews in the stands, filing photos and captions, and writing a computer blog into the wee hours."

For Breyer, the Merrie Monarch is a marathon session of frantic shooting while rubbing elbows with equally eager competitors and trying to avoid being hit by KITV's mobile camera dolly, huddling on a tiny stool while clicking through photos on a laptop, diving under the stage during a break to file a few photos, then starting the process all over again when competition resumes.

You can check Adams' blog Wednesday through Sunday at www.honoluluadvertiser.com.

Senior editor Anne Harpham is The Advertiser's reader representative. Reach her at aharpham@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8033.