Leslie Wilcox Blogs

B.J. Penn on "Leahey & Leahey"

Hilo's B.J. Penn, the Irish/Korean mixed martial arts fighter who's known for flexibility and fearlessness and for not letting a challenger's greater size keep him from a match-up, will join Jim and Kanoa Leahey tomorrow (Wed., May 30, 2012) at 7:30 pm on PBS Hawaii. The show will also be available online at www.pbshawaii.org

Why I Like to Read Obituaries

I like to read obituaries, and not because I'm consumed by death. I read them because many obituaries are full of life.

As an  example, the family of Roselani Ma'a Hee, posted a notice to let others know their wife, mother, tutu, auntie and friend has passed away at age 82. And yes, life shines here:

"In lieu of donations, the family request that you enjoy yourself. A life well-lived. Pau for now. A hui hou."

Go for it, Taggart!

All of us at PBS Hawaii join others across the state in sending aloha and wishing good luck to Taggart Nakamoto, Hawaii's rep in the 2012 Scripps National Spelling Bee. Preliminaries start tomorrow just outside Washington DC. Just pau with sixth grade at Konawaena, Taggart is from a family of passionate spellers. His competitors include three 2011 championship finalists and a six-year-old girl who emerged as a champ from Virginia. Like 19 other spellers, Taggart has at least one relative who has competed in previous national finals.

You can find fun factoids at the bee website, www.spellingbee.com. Once again, ESPN is showing the finals of the bee. Best wishes to Taggart!

Kepa Maly Tonight on "Long Story Short"

--Kepa Maly, guest on "Long Story Short" Tuesday, May 29, 2012, encoring at 11 pm May 30 and 4 pm June 3 on PBS Hawaii

I had to wait a long time, but I finally found out something I wondered about in the 1980s, when I met Kepa Maly. Back then, he was an interpretive park ranger at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island. A Caucasian man, he spoke humbly but authoritatively--and mesmerizingly!-- about the stories and customs of Hawaiian fire and volcanoes. And...he spoke the Hawaiian language as if he were a native Hawaiian kahu who'd just walked out of clouds of ancient steam in the lava fields. I didn't have time to find out Kepa's personal story. I was a Honolulu news reporter and had to jump on a plane to meet deadline. But I did find myself thinking back to the unusual man sharing with volcano visitors and hoped I'd have a chance to learn what factors had shaped his cultural passion and knowledge.

Tonight, on "Long Story Short," you'll hear Kepa explain why he thinks and breathes in Hawaiian and why he's made cultural research his profession. It's a fascinating story about an alienated teen sent to live somewhere very different from home, and that's where found a sense of connection.

Today, Kepa serves as Executive Director of the Lanai Culture and Heritage Center. If you aren't able to watch the program on TV, catch it anytime online at www.pbshawaii.org/ourproductions/longstory.php You'll also find a written transcript. I think Kepa and his wife and fellow researcher Onaona Maly are two very special people without whom Hawaii simply wouldn't be as rich.

 

Quick Reality-Show Quiz

PBS chief Paula Kerger has been citing an interesting statistic in speeches around the country.

Quiz: What percentage of TV programming is in the reality show genre?

Ms. Kerger's answer:  56%!

Whew, that's a lotta reality shows, and it's a depressing figure, because so many of the shows play to the lowest common-denominator of the viewing public in an effort to capture a large audience.

PBS has nothing against reality. That's what its documentaries are all about. With context and quality storytelling.

I'm excited about the next PBS documentary by filmmaker Ken Burns, The Dust Bowl, coming this fall. The teaser says: "It was America's worst man-made ecological disaster...let Ken Burns take you inside the real Dust Bowl." 

Check out the eerie photos at http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/dustbowl/

 

TV Rundown for Rest of Week

PBS Hawaii's new co-production with Pacific Islanders in Communications, PACIFIC HEARTBEAT, is attracting viewers across the country, with more than 80% of public television stations electing to carry these culturally authentic Pacific programs. This week on the national series, our featured program is Papa Mau: The Wayfinder (Sat., May 19, 2012. 8:00 pm). It tells the story of the historic 1974 sailing of the voyaging canoe Hōkūle‘a from Hawaii to Tahiti using non-instrument navigation. This event captured the imagination of people throughout the Pacific Rim. Master navigator Mau Piailug guided the voyage.

Mau, who has since passed away, was a Micronesian who lived in the Yap island group. Thousands of his fellow Micronesians have relocated to Hawaii, where they encounter unfamiliar and difficult social terrain. They come here to make use of a federal diplomatic arrangement known as the Compact of Free Association.

The next INSIGHTS ON PBS HAWAII (Thurs., May 17, 2012, 8:00 pm) looks at the problems facing Micronesians in Hawaii. Joining moderator Dan Boylan are scheduled guests: Patricia McManaman, Director of the State Department of Human Services; Neal Palafox, MD, Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, UH John A. Burns School of Medicine; and Innocenta Sound-Kikku, Vice Chair of the Micronesian Health Advisory Coalition.

INSIGHTS is also available online via live streaming. We want to hear from you! Your questions and comments are welcome via phone, email, Twitter or live blogging. You may also email your questions ahead of time to insights@pbshawaii.org

Many of Hawaii's residents of Chinese ancestry trace their family origins to southern China. Searching for Roots in Canton (Sat., May 19, 2012, 10:00 pm) follows two Chinese Americans from San Francisco, CA. to south China as they search for their ancestral homes. Both gain a clearer perspective of what it means to be Chinese as well as American. 

Fans of GREAT PERFORMANCES: how's this for a show? Combine two storylines from Shakespeare with the music of the Baroque masters, performed by some of the world's best singers, and you have the next GREAT PERFORMANCES AT THE MET (Fri., May 18, 2012, 9:00 pm). Placido Domingo puts in an appearance on The Enchanted Island, an otherworldly version of The Tempest island, where lovers from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream are shipwrecked. Works by Handel, Vivaldi, Rameau and others are set to Jeremy Sams' new libretto, with leading roles by David Daniels and Joyce DiDonato (pictured).

On the next edition of HIKI NŌ (Thurs., May 17, 2012,7:30 pm), Maui High School correspondents profile a woman whose mother is living with Alzheimer's disease. In Honolulu, Iolani School student journalists show us a fertile environment for budding poets at The ARTS at Mark's Garage downtown. Hosted by students from Halau Ku Mana Charter School in Honolulu, this episode also features reports from Kealakehe High School (Hawaii Island); Island School (Kauai); Maui Waena Intermediate School (Maui); Ewa Makai Middle School, Kainalu Elementary School and Leilehua High School on Oahu.

This HIKI NŌ newscast encores Saturday, May 19, 2012, at 12:30 pm and Sunday, May 20, at 3:00 pm. You may also view this newscast and past episodes on our website, www.pbshawaii.org/hikino

The complex chorus of bellows and grunts coming from the koala bear is a secret language that scientists strive to decode on the next NATURE (Wed., May 16, 2012, 8:00 pm). In Cracking the Koala Code, scientists track four koala bears in Australia to discover the marsupials' secrets for survival.

Bones of Turkana (Wed., May 16, 2012, 10:00 pm) follows paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey and his wife Meave, daughter Louise and their colleagues to Kenya's Turkana Basin on their mission to understand the mysteries of human evolution.

Social justice curriculum gets a close look on INDEPENDENT LENS (Thurs., May 17, 2012, 10:00 pm). Spending a year in Tucson, AZ, filmmakers chronicled Tucson High School's Mexican American Studies Program and how it transformed students' lives with Precious Knowledge, but not without controversy.

SIMPLY MING (Sat., May 19, 2012, 5:30 pm) goes to San Francisco where Ming joins a tequila master for this episode, Julio Bermejo and Cooking with Spirits. Julio and Ming explore amazing food stalls at the Ferry Plaza Farmer's Market before heading back to the Bermejo's turf, Tommy's Mexican Restaurant, to cook on the fly.

RUDY MAXA'S WORLD (Sat., May 19, 2012,  7:30 pm) shows us the rugged coastline, exotic birds and indigenous plants found in South Africa: Garden Route and Wine Country, including the village of Franschhoek.

Chinese American filmmaker Theresa Loong knew little about her father's past until she discovered his secret diary, written when he was a teenager and a POW in a Japanese work camp during World War II. Every Day is a Holiday (Sat., May 19, 2012. 9:00 pm) recounts the painful but life-affirming story of Paul Loong's unlikely journey, from Chinese Malay teenager and Japanese POW, to merchant seaman, Veterans Affairs doctor and naturalized citizen of the country that liberated him: the United States.

For more program listings by genre, click here.

Mahalo for supporting PBS Hawaii and helping to advance learning and discovery through life-changing stories. We bring the world to Hawaii and Hawaii to the world. www.pbshawaii.org

Any Child Left Unattended...

Posted sign at the North Shore Coffee Gallery in Haleiwa:

Any child left unattended will receive a shot of espresso and a free dog.

 

 

 

Ron Mizutani is in the house

    That's KHON2 News at Five solo anchor Ron Mizutani sitting at the Leahey & Leahey kitchen table on this evening's (Wed., May 9, 2012) program on PBS Hawaii. You can watch the show on TV at 7:30 and 11:30 pm today or catch it online at www.pbshawaii.org

     Ron formerly held the job that Kanoa Leahey now has at KHON--nightly sports anchor. He moved on to an award-winning career in news. He's winding up that career at the end of this month, leaving the biz for a public relations VP position at Communications Pacific.  No doubt Jim Leahey will ask Ron if THIS time, his departure from news will stick. Ron tried leaving before, in 2007, for a VP position at Hawaiian Telcom, but chose to return to the anchor desk. 

    I go back a long way with Ron!  We were Channel 2 Morning News anchors together in the 1990s, and later we co-anchored the 5 pm news together.  We've worked long stressful days on breaking news stories, and we've laughed and cried together. We both loved field reporting and often jammed back to the station late in the afternoon, logged video and wrote up news stories, and rushed into place on the anchor desk.  More and more, anchoring and field reporting are becoming different jobs.

      With Ron putting aside his reporter's notebook, Hawaii loses yet another broadcast journalist with that combo skillset.  He's a  dynamic, hard-working daily anchor and breaking-news reporter.  I'll miss Ron's Hawaii sensibilities and his tremendous will and focus to "get the story." And his ability to bring us the perspectives of people who normally don't agree to be interviewed. But I have a feeling we'll continue to see Ron on the air and in print in his new role... Wishing him a great new chapter in his life...

Mother's Day Show + Other TV Highlights

"Grown don't mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child.
They get bigger, but grown? What's that suppose to mean?
In my heart it don't mean a thing." ---Toni Morrison, Beloved, 1987

Celebrating Moms is the theme of PBS Hawaii's next LONG STORY SHORT (Tues., May 8, 2012, 7:30 pm). It's a special Mother's Day anthology, featuring memories from previous guests about the first influential woman in their lives. You'll hear from educator Candy Suiso; musical artists Emma Veary, Keola Beamer and Mihana Souza; and business leaders Cha Thompson and Christine Camp. This program is available in high-definition and will be rebroadcast on Wed., May 9, 2012,at 11:00 pm and Sun., May 13, 2012, at 4:00 pm.

On the next episode of HIKI NŌ (Thurs., May 19, 2012, 7:30 pm), Hawaii Island's Hilo High School students profile a young soccer player who is overcoming a tragic family history. From Maui, students at Lahaina Intermediate cover an event organized to help control the community's large feral cat population. The newscast, hosted by Campbell High students in West Oahu, also brings us student reports from: Kapa'a High (Kauai); Molokai High (Molokai); Ka Waihona o ka Naauao Public Charter School, Maryknoll School, Mid-Pacific Institute, and Waianae High on Oahu.

This HIKI NŌ half-hour encores Saturday, May 12, 2012, at 12:30 pm and Sunday, May 13, 2012, at 3:00 pm. You may also view this newscast and past episodes on our website, www.pbshawaii.org/hikino

The down-to-the-wire State budget agreement will be among the topics discussed on the next INSIGHTS ON PBS HAWAII 2012 Legislative Wrap-Up (Thurs., May 10, 2012, 8:00 pm). We're still confirming guests from the State House and Senate. So far, host Dan Boylan's scheduled guests are: Blake Oshiro, Deputy Chief of Staff to Governor Neil Abercrombie; and Sen. Sam Slom, Senate Minority Leader.

INSIGHTS is also available online via live streaming. We want to hear from you! Your questions and comments are welcome via phone, email, Twitter or live blogging. You may also email your questions ahead of time to insights@pbshawaii.org

If you missed this extraordinary program's broadcast premiere last year on PBS Hawaii, I urge you to watch it as it enjoys a national release to PBS stations: Under a Jarvis Moon (Sat., May 12, 2012, 8:00 pm). It's a previously overlooked chapter of World War II that played out on barren Pacific islands with young native Hawaiians. The national showing is part of PACIFIC HEARTBEAT, our co-produced series with Pacific Islanders in Communications. Producer Noelle Kahanu documents the story of 130 young men, mostly Native Hawaiians and many from Kamehameha Schools, sent to make U.S. government claims on the remote islands. Kahanu's own grandfather was one of the colonists.

And here's a British show that Hawaii viewers have been pressing to see. "When is Sherlock coming back?" we keep hearing. The answer is: this weekend on MASTERPIECE CLASSIC! On Sunday, May 6, 2012, at 8:00 pm, Benedict Cumberbatch reprises his role as the contemporary and enigmatic Sherlock Holmes in Sherlock, Series II: A Scandal in Belgravia. Dr. John Watson is played by Martin Freeman. This time, the sleuths take on a case of blackmail involving a dominatrix. Check out the fan screening event PBS held in NYC with Cumberbatch.

There's also been quite a bit of local interest in DESIGNING HEALTHY COMMUNITIES (Sun., May 6, 2012, 10:00 pm). The new series looks at how addressing urban sprawl with design changes could also affect the rising incidence of obesity and Type 2 diabetes. In Retrofitting Suburbia, host Dr. Richard Jackson visits Boulder, CO, where bicycles offer safe alternative transportation. Near Denver, he looks at two mixed-use and public transit-centered communities. Then, Dr. Jackson goes to Georgia to see how an abandoned mall gains new life as a K-8th grade charter school. This is the first of a four-part series airing on Sundays.

Here are other interesting highlights coming up on PBS Hawaii:

Cultural expert and Harvard scholar Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr. goes to India, Korea and Poland in this episode of FINDING YOUR ROOTS (Sun., May 6, 2012, 7:00 pm, encores Tues., May 8, 2012, 11:00 pm). He's helping Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Margaret Cho and Martha Stewart find out more about why their parents or grandparents left the mother country to make a new life in America.

Fish, Mercury and Nutrition: The Net Effects (Sun., April 29, 2012, 9:30 pm) evaluates the benefits of eating ocean fish against the risk of harming unborn children with mercury exposure. (Part of this program was shot in Hawaii.)

ANTIQUES ROADSHOW (Mon., May 7, 2012, 8:00 pm) visits the American Swedish Institute in Minneapolis, MN , Part 1 of 3 for a look at Mora clocks. Highlights from the Roadshow floor include a possible signature George Elmslie chair, a 1900 McKinley-Roosevelt poster and a 1976 yellow diamond ring.

NATURE (Wed., May 9, 2012, 8:00 pm) follows two female white lion cubs on their journey to adulthood. Born in 2009 in South Africa's Kruger Park, The White Lions face challenges of survival in the savannah, made more acute by their high visibility.

INDEPENDENT LENS (Thurs., May 10, 2012, 10:00 pm) tells the story of a young nomadic couple living with their infant daughter in the high grasslands of eastern Tibet. Summer Pasture offers a rare window into a highly insular community seldom seen by outsiders.

Veracruz, Mexico is where Vanilla: The Sacred Orchid (Thurs., May 10, 2012, 11:30 pm) originated and is still being grown on small farms today. This program looks at the cultivation of the vanilla bean, from hand pollination of the orchid flowers to harvesting and drying.

CRAFT IN AMERICA (Fri., May 11, 2012, 9:00 pm) looks at woven textiles and story quilts. The works of artists Faith Ringgold (pictured) in New York, Randall Darwall in Massachusetts, Consuelo Jimenez Underwood in California and Terese Agnew in Wisconsin are presented in Threads.

An acclaimed locally-produced music documentary about the Kamehameha Schools Song Contest is getting a national release to PBS stations. Island viewers saw this on PBS Hawaii in November 2010. Now a (shorter) PBS national cut is available, and we are pleased to re-broadcast One Voice (Fri., May 11, 2012, 10:00 pm, encores Sat., May 12, at 9:00 pm). The program features the personal stories of student song directors directing their peers in singing Hawaiian music in four-part harmony.

LIVE FROM THE ARTISTS DEN (Fri., May 11, 2012, 11:00 pm) went to Atlanta's historic Buckhead Theatre for a marathon performance by 11-piece band Iron and Wine. The group played songs from their recent album, Kiss Each Other Clean, plus favorites like "Naked as We Came" and "Boy With a Coin." Leader Sam Beam closed the night with a solo version of the brand-new song "Flightless Bird, American Mouth."

SIMPLY MING (Sat., May 12, 5:30 pm) filets a whole fish into boneless pieces. In Bryan Caswell and Filleting Fish, the Houston chef joins Ming to create tea-smoked trout with Thai cucumber tomato salad, and crispy-skin snapper with fennel and Swiss chard.

RUDY MAXA'S WORLD (Sat., May 12, 2012, 7:30 pm) goes to South Africa: Cape Town. Host Rudy takes us through "Africa's Riviera," from Table Mountain to Cape Peninsula and other natural wonders that surround this city.

Joann Sfar Draws From Memory (Sat., May 12, 2012, 10:00 pm) profiles the Algerian and Eastern-European Jewish heritage of the artist who created the graphic novel Little Vampire and the film Gainsbourg: Vie Heroique.

 

 

 

 

For more program listings by genre, click here.

Doing the Wave at 'Iolani Palace!

Here are the benches just up the mauka stairway at 'Iolani Palace where a guide seats tour-takers and gives a briefing. Our PBS Hawaii student techs felt like they were sitting roller-coaster-style, and they did the Wave!

We visited the palace as part of educating ourselves to produce a television music special featuring Na Lani 'Eha--that is, the four ali'i, including Queen Liliuokalani and King Kalakaua, who composed music. Docent Maggie Keener gave us wonderful background on the palace and palace life. Most rulers commission the creation of original music for the benefit of their people--these members of royalty originated the music themselves! I'll be sharing more about the special later. It will air Sunday evening, June 11, 2012.