HEART: Growing Hilo’s Love for Theater

By Mālielani Larish

Performing arts lovers of all ages are lucky that Larry Reitzer grew disenchanted with lounging on the beach. After a 30-year career in the entertainment industry, Larry retired and moved to Hilo with the intention of penning a play and relaxing by the seashore.

However, a wise friend gave him this advice: “If you really want to be part of the Big Island, don’t ask what you can take, ask what you can bring.”

After a few months of watching the dolphins and whales from his cliff-top lānai (porch) in Onomea, he arrived at the solution: to bring more theater to Hilo. Together with musical director Charles Bankhead Haines, Larry founded HEART, or Hilo Education Arts Repertory Theater, which has driven up the quantity and quality of theatrical performances in East Hawai‘i. HEART especially focuses on creating more on-stage and behind-the-scenes opportunities for youth through education and mentorship, and the achievements of HEART performers attest to the nonprofit’s ability to cultivate young talent.

If You Build It, They Will Come

When Larry first moved to Hilo, acquaintances told him that the majority of kids here shy away from acting, but Larry suspected that youth here simply needed more opportunities to perform. With every production that he has directed, more kids and teens show up to audition, eventually necessitating the expansion of Hilo’s Palace Theater stage. Larry directed his inaugural production in Hawai‘i, the Disney musical Aladdin Jr., in association with Center Stage Dance Studio at University of Hawai‘i at Hilo. Two hundred kids performed in it, and he noted that although most of the kids were dancers, “the kids got really excited about learning the songs, the lines, and the blocking.” Blocking, also known as staging, is the process of working out the nuances of actors’ on-stage movements, body positions, and body language in order to best animate the story.

Although Larry needed only eight kids for his next show, Gypsy, 29 kids showed up for the audition, and he found ways to put the majority of them into the show. This is when he learned that the Palace Theater’s stage was too small, so the Palace built the stage out to accommodate the additional cast.

In 2020, Larry announced auditions for the Palace Theater’s first youth musical, Beauty and the Beast. Although the Palace Theater had staged a yearly musical since 2002, Beauty and the Beast was the first to feature a cast comprised mainly of young people and the first to focus on providing them with mentoring throughout the production process. Charles Bankhead Haines, who had been patiently awaiting the right opportunity to dive into Hilo’s theater scene, scored the role of the Beast. Although Charles grew up in the small town of Birmingham, Alabama, he benefited tremendously from a youth theater program there (run by Red Mountain Theater Company), which brings in Broadway performers, directors, and choreographers to give kids and teens training in how to be theater professionals. “They instilled the confidence in me that theater could be a lifestyle,” he says gratefully.

As they worked together on Beauty and the Beast, Larry realized the breadth of Charles’ musical talent and his enthusiasm for teaching and mentoring youth. While the world closed down due to the pandemic, Larry and Charles founded HEART over countless cups of coffee. With Larry as the executive director and Charles as the artistic director, HEART officially became a nonprofit in 2020.

Making Connections with Professionals

Unfortunately, pandemic restrictions shut Beauty and the Beast down the week before it was set to debut in March 2020. To keep his cast and crew inspired, Larry started a Zoom lecture series that drew on his extensive connections in show business. Larry’s credentials are impressive: he spent 10 years as a company manager for Broadway classics like Les Misérables and Phantom of the Opera in New York. After moving to the opposite coast, he spent 20 years working in television production and as a writer for such acclaimed shows as Ugly Betty, Spin City, and Just Shoot Me.

His first guest for the Zoom series was Marc delaCruz, a Hilo native who made headlines by becoming the first Asian-American to play the role of founding father Alexander Hamilton in the Broadway hit Hamilton. Another guest, Dan Jinks, who won Oscars for his productions of American Beauty and Milk, talked to the kids about writing, producing, and directing. Larry also invited guests to talk about exactly how to audition for Broadway, and one of his long-time colleagues, Scott Genkinger, spoke to the students about television casting.

Although growing up on our remote archipelago may feel isolating, Charles believes that young people here should keep dreaming big. “If they develop the skills and a sense of professionalism, they can totally succeed in the world of theater,” he says.

Working Alongside Professionals

Youth who join a HEART production benefit from the theater company’s emphasis on providing young adults and teens with mentorship. “Mentorship is a really big part of HEART. That is one of our most important responsibilities: to really train people,” Larry says. In every show, the director, musical director, stage manager, lighting designer, and set designer—all adults with professional theater experience—are each paired with a young assistant.

Some people ask Larry if mentoring young protégés makes the producing and directing process more difficult. “No,” says Larry. “It makes it so much more rewarding knowing that we are taking a little extra time and energy to nurture and build the future arts leaders of our community.”

In addition, youth are coached to keep refining their artistic skills and exceeding their expectations, something that 21-year-old Kea‘au resident Ku‘uhiapo Jeong truly appreciates. After discovering his love for theater as a Kamehameha Schools Hawai‘i Campus student, Ku‘uhiapo had the honor of starring as Aladdin in Larry’s first Hilo production. He says that Larry’s emphasis on professionalism and producing art of the highest caliber really helped him develop as an actor. While simultaneously working on his master’s degree at Biola University, Ku‘uhiapo is receiving Larry’s mentorship as an associate director in HEART productions. The HEART community has become Ku‘uhiapo’s second family, one in which he can be “weird and quirky, and bust out in song” without worrying about being judged.

Seventeen-year-old Sam Deitch, who has starred in five of Larry’s productions over the past four years, echoes Ku‘uhiapo’s thoughts on HEART. “Theater has become my home,” he says. “It is a very welcoming and safe space where people can truly express themselves.” Sam, who attends Ke Kula ‘o Nāwahīokalani‘ōpu‘u Hawaiian language immersion charter school, says that “meeting Larry definitely sparked my interest in theater. He made me realize all the different things you can do with theater.” Sam is currently working as the musical director’s assistant for Cabaret and plans to major in musical theater in college.

Alumni Dream Big

Some of the talented individuals that Larry has worked with are already making it big in performing arts. Makoa Kala‘i, who played the lead role in Biloxi Blues, a drama about eight teens in basic military training that Larry directed in 2020, is studying performing arts at New York University, where he landed the lead role in the university’s production of Pippin. Kyra Gomes, who played Belle in Beauty and the Beast, is pursuing her bachelors of fine arts in theater at Oklahoma City University.

Meili Aspen, who starred as Princess Jasmine in Aladdin, in HEART’s Christmas shows, and as the female lead in Gypsy, scored the role of a young Katy Perry in the mega-star’s “Electric” music video. The 15-year-old Waiākea student also starred on American Idol and plans to pursue an acting career in New York.

Looking Forward

Lion King Jr., comprised entirely of a cast that is 21 years old and younger, opens this October at the Palace Theater. Based on the sold-out success of Beauty and the Beast, this classic Disney tale promises to be a blockbuster. Next summer, HEART plans to host a summer camp that will offer young performers lessons in singing and dancing, as well as all aspects of stage operations, including lighting, sound, and set construction. Save for a nominal registration fee, the camp will be offered free of charge to all participants who sign up. Charles says that the summer camp will be designed to “grow kids’ love of theater in every way possible way” by showing them how to develop a show from the ground up.

Ironically, Larry’s original vision of idling on the beach has been replaced by a packed rehearsal schedule; three rehearsals in one day is not unusual for him. “In Hawai‘i I am just non-stop,” he muses. Now his vacation time is spent in New York, where he doesn’t have to do anything besides eat pizza and watch his friends’ theater productions.

Through HEART, Larry and Charles are both excited to keep cultivating theater opportunities for youth while developing Hilo’s appreciation for theater with thrilling, courageous, and provocative performances. “We feel so blessed to be here,” Larry says. “Getting to do what we love and giving back to our young arts-loving community is a real gift for us and something we are grateful for every day.” ❖

For more information:
hearthilo.org
facebook.com/groups/138523951459426/