 I'm the host of Think Tech Hawaii's Law Across the Sea. Today we're going to walk across the sea of life with my guest, Alan Okubo. Mr. Okubo is a Hawaii lawyer who has been practicing law in Hawaii for about 40 years. However, during that time he has also had an acting career in film, theater, and on television. Despite all the advertisements for lawyers and law firms that are broadcast every night on local television, Alan Okubo is probably the one Hawaii lawyer who was seen most often. Recently in commercials for vacations Hawaii, Hawaii State Federal Credit Union, and HEMIC, among others. Alan and I will discuss his dual roles and what he plays in them, and what he has learned from performing on both stages. So, lights, camera, action, welcome Alan. Hello Mark. How are you? Okay fine. Good to see you. Same here, we haven't seen each other for one week. Well, I know you've been a lawyer in Hawaii for about 40 years because so have I. And during that period of time we've interacted quite a bit. Right. And I'd like to ask, first of all, before we go into your other roles and the other plays that you've been in, how did you become a lawyer? How did that happen? I don't know if people remember, but about 1973, State was running out of money. So I think it was a Sunday, George Ariyoshi was the governor at the time, and he had to balance the budget otherwise the state was going to shut down. So what he decided to do was he fired 600 teachers on the Sunday so that Monday the state could run. I was student teaching at the time, so I said, it's not a good thing to do because by the time they hire the 600 back, it's going to be a couple of years before they're going to hire new teachers. So a friend of mine was saying, well, he was going to take the LSAT. I said, what's that? He said, well, it's so you can go to law school. I go, well, I will try to take it too. So took it. It didn't score very high, but I somehow got into Cal Western. So it worked out after that. Well, how times have changed? I mean, when you think about now we need teachers nowadays, I don't know if we need more lawyers, but we need teachers nowadays. And I can't imagine them firing all those teachers. So at that point in your life, you figured there may not be a future in teaching. You thought you might want to be a teacher. And so you changed your course. It's funny how events outside of our own lives will make our course and what roles we play change. I want it to be a teacher because you get summers off, you get spring break, you get Christmas break. I figured that's a good thing. I didn't factor in all the hard work you had to do in between. Daily. Yeah, right. And now, so you decided to try law because a buddy suggested, today give it a shot and you ultimately went to law school. But during that time, were you involved in acting also? When I was at UH, I needed one more class. So I literally went through the whole catalog to look for a class that I didn't have to really study hard for. And I came across beginning acting and said, no papers, no exams. So I called them. I said, is this true? No papers, no exams. I said, yes. I said, OK, sign me up. And I had no idea what I was going to get into. That's basically how I got into it. Otherwise, I wouldn't have even gone into that direction. And prior to that, you had no idea, no thought. You weren't involved in a class play sometime that... Stage fright. I couldn't even give a speech. I stood there and I stammered. Well, times have changed. Now you do a lot of acting and you play a lot of roles. Give us some idea of what you've been doing in the acting career. And then maybe we'll go back and talk a little bit about your attorney career. OK, well, when I first started, after I finished taking two classes at UH on acting, and most of the people were going to be theater majors, and because you're a theater major, you go to plays, which takes two, three months. And I couldn't see doing that. So what I did was I called up Hawaii 5-0. I said, how do I sign up? So they said, come on down. So I went down there, filled up the paperwork. So I started working as an extra. On Hawaii 5-0? Yeah. And that was with... Jack Lord. Jack Lord, wow. OK. That was how I got into business, because Margaret Doversola was a casting director at that time for extras. And then later on, she became a casting director for actors. But when she was casting for extras, she used to call me up and said, bring your white outfit, because that was a hospital attendant. So I had outfits all stacked up. Bring your white one. OK. And a couple of weeks later, she says, bring your blue one. OK. That was for like attendance for something else, but not hospital-related, like workers for something else. OK. So it was like part-time job for me. So I was lucky, because I used to get called every week, two weeks. I used to work. I mean, it wasn't great money. But back then, it was good for a part-time job, because you could bring your books and study. Because most of the time, you're just sitting there doing nothing. So you were still in college at the time. OK. And then you graduated. And you decided teaching, because of quiet and effective, governor is not going to work. So you went into law. What happened on the law career? Are you doing these things at the same time? You're doing the law studies and acting? Yeah. And then you went through law school. And you were on the mainland, Cal Western. And were you doing acting while you were over there? No. I was thinking of trying to do one. But the only one that was playing at that time was, I can't even think of the name, was two brothers. They were detectives. It was based out of San Diego. So I know they were filming over there. But I didn't have an agent over there. So I said, ah, it's too much work to do that. Plus, you know, going to law school, you don't survive first year. I never read so much in my life. OK. So you're going to law school. You kind of got hooked a little bit on the acting. Right? I mean, it sounds like you kind of liked it. That was a good diversion. OK. Was it something that was relaxing? Or was it something that just made life a little better for you? Or what did you see in the acting? It was a chance to play different characters and do different things and explore different parts of your personality. I tell young students when they're thinking of going into acting. And they said, well, I get nervous. I said, well, I get nervous too. But what you need to do is, when you're acting, just tell yourself it's not you making a fool out of yourself. It's the character that you're playing. So if you're playing Joe Smith, Joe Smith's the one that's either looking bad or looking good. It's not you, Bob Jones, that is the real character. You can detach yourself. And that's the way I do it. I mean, so that I can separate myself and just be the character. OK. Now, eventually you went through law school, graduated, came back to Hawaii. What was the law career? What did you look for? What were you interested in and how did that work out? That one kind of evolved into doing collection work, civil work. I started working for Alex Kim while sharing space with Alex Kim. And he was doing collection and civil matters. So he kind of nurtured me and taught me the business. So I ended up just staying in that field and pretty much have done that my whole career. That's been your career. And that's how we kind of got to know each other too, because we both did the same type of thing. In that case, who are your clients, generally speaking? Well, I mean, not names, but... Some collection agencies, some car dealerships, some retail stores. Mostly businesses. Mostly businesses. That type of thing. Yeah. OK. All right. So your practice is law. What happens to acting? What's going on? Are you doing both at the same time? And how did that come about? I mean, you came back to Hawaii, passed the bar. Now you're a lawyer. Why do acting? What drew you? I mean, is there a connection there? Well, when I came back from law school, I went back and did film work again. So I was working with Magnum, Jake and the Fat Man. As an extra? No, no. Once you qualified to be an actor, you switched unions. Back then it was two unions. SAG was extras and SAG was actors. I see. So when I qualified for SAG, I just switched. I just went straight into acting and didn't do extra work anymore. And just went into acting. OK. Well, you're going to have to tell us what the difference is. The amount of money you get. OK. Well, that's it. For the time you're going to work, the amount of money. I see. So it was worth it to be an actor, not extra. Because the extra was going to take too much time. And you're not going to get... You know, you can't give up your day job for doing extra work. I see. So being an extra is kind of like in training to be an actor. Well, back then it was. I mean, now the pay is a little better for extras. And if you work at right, some people can make a living. Because especially if you go to the mainland, because there's so many different studios running around, you can go every day, you could be working someplace. So you could make a living, you know. Over here, it's restrictive. You've got Hawaii Five-O, you've got Magnum. And that's the only two studios running around right now. And you've got independent films coming in. But it's not enough that you're going to be able to make a living. So it's kind of hard to justify doing that over here. Full time. Full time. Okay. But you still like to hold on to that. You like the acting career on top or in conjunction with the lawyer career. Why? Is there anything you found that was similar about both? Was there something in both of those roles that you played that were similar or that worked together? Or were they so different that that's what attracted you to them? Well, the similarity is you have to pretty much speak or convey whether you're an attorney or whether you're acting. You have to convey whatever you're trying to... You're talking to an audience. Yeah. So that part is similar. The acting part is there's nothing on the line. I mean, I don't do criminal, but if you were doing criminal work and if you don't do it right, somebody goes to jail. But in acting, it's usually, especially film, they can reshoot it. And as long as you don't get reshot too many times and the director won't get mad at you. But if you keep screwing up, then they say, okay, give me somebody else. So you need to be prepared. And that was a good thing about Jack Lorne because his model was one shot every time. Wow. Because back then it was film. Now they're doing digital. So you can kind of fool around with digital and just shoot over it if you want to. Film, once you shoot it, it's gone. So it was his money because he was pretty much an executive director. I mean, producer. So he wanted it. He wanted everybody to come in prepared if you were going to be speaking, know your roles, know your lines, know your blocking, what you're supposed to be doing so that he could just say, okay, we're going to rehearse one time and then we'll shoot. But now because it's digital, there's more people playing around. We did a magnum at the St. Andrew's Priory and a local actor that lives in L.A., Clyde Kasatsu was doing a scene with Selleck except they're shooting from inside the church, shooting Clyde. Selleck's standing behind the camera, feeding Clyde lines and Clyde's standing there going, Selleck's in the back going, and I'm looking at him like, oh my God, and Clyde's trying not to laugh, but Selleck's feeding him the lines and making all kinds of faces, and finally he just broke up. And because it's digital, it wasn't that major. It wasn't that critical. Now look, we're going to take a break right now. One minute break, and we're going to come back. And I want to ask you a little bit about the roles that you played. Both on screen and theater and in court. We'll be right back. And Aloha. My name is Calvin Griffin, a host of Hawaii in Uniform. And every Friday at 11 o'clock here on Think Tech Hawaii, we bring in the latest in what's happening within the military community. And we also invite your response to things that's happening here. For those of you who haven't seen the program before, again, we invite your participation. We're here to give information, not disinformation. And we always enjoy response from the public. But join us here, Hawaii in Uniform, Fridays, 11 a.m. here on Think Tech Hawaii. Aloha. Aloha, I'm Dave Stevens, host of the Cyber Underground. This is where we discuss everything that relates to computers that's going to scare you out of your mind. So come join us every week here on ThinkTechHawaii.com, 1 p.m. on Friday afternoons. And then you can go see all our episodes on YouTube. Just look up the Cyber Underground on YouTube. All our shows will show up. And please follow us. We're always giving you current, relevant information to protect you. Keeping you safe. Aloha. Welcome back. I am Mark Shklov with Alan Okubo. And we are here talking about his roles as a lawyer and an actor. And Alan, you've talked about you're doing two plays at the same time. One is lawyering and one is acting. And you like them both. Yeah. Lawyers, is that... Can you like being a lawyer? Is that a... It's better to be born independently rich, but not in the cards for everybody. I'm still waiting. Yeah, I know. Okay. All right. So in your attorney role, what was that like? Was that a search for the truth or a search to represent people? Or what is that? And how does that compare with your roles as acting and acting? Well, just try to... You know, you represent your client and you try to put your client's facts in the best light for the judge. And that's your audience as a judge. And I don't know when you started, but when I started, I had no clue what I was doing. I walked into the room and I stood there and the judge looked at me and says, What do you want? I go, I think you want a default. Okay. He says, Do you want this? Yes. So the judge was like the director in a way. I mean, I had a learning curve and took me a couple of months before I figured out what... Well, even in law school, it took me almost a month to figure out what torts was. I thought it was a baking class. I mean, literally, I think, What is torts? I mean, you've got criminal law, you've got civil law, and they call it torts. And they never just said it was non-criminal law, but they just call it that fancy word. Okay. Now, in your law career, did having that background and acting help at all? I guess, because if I didn't have that, I may have been more nervous than I would have normally been. So, I kind of could detach myself a little bit and say it's the lawyer talking, not me, per se. Okay. All right. That makes sense. Now, I asked you for some of your favorite roles, and you sent me a couple of photos, one of Matsujiro Otani. And let's see if we can have his photo up. Now, who is this, and what was this about? Matsujiro Otani was born in 1890. He died in 1972. He was basically, he was a fishmonger when he came from Japan to Hawaii. And so he used to buy fish at the fish market, go around the island, selling it, and then eventually what he did was he bought some land at all, a market all apart. Right. And then he brought in all the other independent vendors so that they had a place to sell. So he became like a landlord for all these small independent merchants. And then just about, in fact, December 7, 1941, he had remodeled the area, and it was going to have a grand opening the day of the bombing. Oh, my gosh. He went home that night. FBI came, arrested him, and he was in the internment camp at Sand Island. Later on he got transferred to New Mexico, and eventually he went to Colorado. But they arrested him because they felt that he was an organizer and was someone that was of potential danger to the government because he was a person of prominence in organizing these others. And because he was in the fishing business and they were going out on a daily basis that they were communicating with the Japanese while they were out at sea and giving them information. And he was Japanese. Yes, he was Japanese. And the photo that we showed was your, you dressed up as a fishmonger. That's what he used to dress like, as a fishmonger. And what was your feeling about this play and this role, both as an actor and as a lawyer? Well, this is a film, a documentary, it was put on by the Japanese Chamber of Commerce. And this is a second in the series. There was another one I did a couple of years before. I can't remember who the person I was at that time, but the reason they're trying to archive all these things is to show what happened to the internments over here because everybody knows what happened to the internments in the mainland. So there's a big site now at Lulule that they've uncovered and they're trying to, they've made it into a national park area. And the Lano Zone, my Monsanto Monsanto donated it to the, I'm not sure if they donated it to the JCC or to another nonprofit. And eventually it's going to get cleaned up and have tours and all that going over there. There's not many, there's no surviving buildings. There's surviving concrete areas where some buildings were because all the, if you look at some photos of the Lulule campsite, it was in this desolate valley and was pretty much just like a desert. And that's where they brought prominent Japanese and interned them. Not only Japanese, Italians and Germans also. And it's interesting to know that Mr. Otani's kids went on to fight in the U.S. Army. And... His family ran the market while he was gone. His son Akira joined the 100th Battalion. And just before he was going to go to Casio, Italy, which the unit that went there pretty much got wiped out. He got called into the officers' candidate school at the last minute. So he locked out as far as having to go. His other three sons also were in the Army, but they weren't overseas as far as I know. It was not too much issue on that. And another son was here doing broadcast intelligence work in Hawaii. Maybe there are some lessons there for us to learn as we go forward here in the United States. You also sent me a photo of... One more thing about Otani. After he came back from internment, he started United Fishing Agency, which is where the fish market is now. So anytime they buy fish, they buy it from United Fishing Agency, which is started by him. And life went on for him. He said he put it behind him. You sent me a photo of Ironius. Ironius. What was that about? There is Ironius, you in that role. Who is Ironius and where is that from? This is from a play, a funny thing happened on the way to the forum that was at Manoa Valley Theater. Ironius was... I think he was either Greek or Roman. In fact, I think it was Greek, but his job was to roam around looking for his children, his twin son and daughter that were stolen from him in infancy. And Soudalus, who was played by Zero Mostel in the movie and in the play, was played here by Ren Helford. But he's checking him into leaving so that they could use his house to do some other things. Nefarious. Yes, nefarious. So he ended up roaming seven times around Rome, seven hills of Rome looking for his kids. Which the good part is, what? He actually found them. At the end, yes. His son was a captain in the Roman army and his daughter was a concubine and they were going to get married and then they found out that they were actually brother and sister and split that part up and then he found them and everybody lived happily ever after. So you've done drama and comedy both. Which do you prefer? Do you like them both? I like them both. I mean, it's two different mediums. Drama, you can let out different parts of your emotions and feelings and convey them. Comedy is, again, a different part of your emotions. So it's two different mediums with both of them are fun. Now, talk about fun. You also do commercials. And I see them when I watch TV at night. And I want to ask you about these commercials. I'm dying to know it's something. Vacations in Hawaii, you do one and it shows you in Vegas. Did you really go to Vegas? Is that really what happened? They shipped you to Vegas to do a commercial? Yeah. You got paid for that? Yeah. What was that like? What was that experience like? That was fun because we left Friday, came back Tuesday. We only worked two out of four days. So you're really having the experience, too? Yeah. And as part of that, did they film you doing those things or did you get to do those on your own and then for the commercial actually had to act? Well, the commercial part we're acting and then the rest of the time we do whatever we wanted to do for the other two days. So they weren't filming you actually gambling and stuff. That was just all play acting. Yeah. But you knew how to do it. Yeah. Well, as long as it's not my chips, it's fine. Okay. Now, I want to ask you just before we close to tell us what have you learned about acting and law in your career? Well, whatever you're going to do, whether it's acting or law, commit yourself to what you're going to do so that whichever one you're doing or both or whatever, when you're doing it, you're doing it to the best you can. And we were... there's a lot of theaters now in a way and there's more opportunity for people to get into acting over here now. So it's a good opportunity for people, younger people to jump in. And the good thing now, I've seen a lot of high school plays recently in the last five years and the talent level has just gone up so much. I mean, it's just unbelievable. Would you tell those young actors to become lawyers also and do the same roles that you have played? I tell everybody who wants to be a lawyer says be a dentist. You get paid to inflict pain. Okay, well, all right, Alan. So I suppose both of us will come back eventually and play different roles, dentist and neurosurgeon or something like that. And I appreciate you coming today, learning about your dual roles and what you've played in acting and as an attorney. So thank you very much. You're welcome. Aloha. Thank you.