 Hi, welcome to ThinkTech. We are raising public awareness about technology, energy, diversity, and globalism. This show is center stage. I'm your host, Donna Blanchard, proud managing director of Kuru Kukua Theatre. And we are coming to you live from Pioneer Plaza in the heart of downtown Honolulu, very near Kuru Kukua Theatre. I'd like to let you know right away if at any point during the show today you would like to join in the conversation, you may do so, you may tweet to us at ThinkTechHI. And we will get notification of your tweet here in the student. We can answer your question or just read your comment. I'm very happy to introduce to you a young woman today. Her name is Brienne Johnson. She's a student at Mid-Pacific Institute. And she also works with Eden Lee Murray with the Young Actors Ensemble that is currently training at Kuru Kukua Theatre. Welcome Brienne. Hi. Hi, thank you very much for being here. Thank you for having me. It's nice you came into the studio. This was sort of last minute. Yeah, I thought of, I wanted to have you on the show because you asked me some very interesting questions. And this is for, is this for a school project? Yeah, in my Hawaiian studies class we are doing projects on, we got to choose a place on island that is either significant to Hawaii or significant to us. So I wanted to talk about Kumakuhua just because of what you guys do there and because of how the theater helped us find a space for our junior ensembles to work. Oh, okay, cool. And the junior ensemble has been in existence for several years, but recently needed a new home. Yeah. And as soon as Eden Lee let me know about that, we jumped on it. Because in order for Kumakuhua Theatre to survive, we need to constantly be nurturing new artists' playwrights as well as actors and technicians and designers. And I have very high hopes that you and maybe some of the other students will want to come back to Kumu in various capacities. So what is it that, do you mind if I grill you a little bit? What is it about Kumakuhua that interested you enough to say, that's the project that I want other than us working with Eden Lee? And if that's the major thing, that's fine too. Whenever I'm given a project in school, I like to sort of channel it to what I'm interested in. That way I don't get bored and then my project ends up more interesting because it's what I'm passionate about. So I wanted to talk about theater in this project and a little bit about writing too. And I thought that it was really cool that you guys work with new playwrights or work with original plays written here. And it's very community-based, which is also what the requirement for the project was to find a way to talk about the community here on Hawaii. Yeah, yay on all counts. And if you, whatever you do for a living, if it's something you're passionate about, you're going to be great at it too. How wonderful that at your school they have you do a project like that. What year are you at Midpeck? My senior year. Oh, okay. Yeah. And was there, and forgive me, my ignorance. Is that, that is, it's a private school? Yeah, it's a private school. Okay, so it's a school that you would like to go into. And it's very art-centric. We have a lot of arts in Midpeck. Yeah. That's awesome. And you have some really great graduates come out of school. A lot of them involved at Kumakuhua Theater. So part of the reason, she sent me these wonderful questions that really made me think about what it is that I like about Kumakuhua Theater and my job and what we do in our community. And particularly in light of what's going on in the world right now. I thought it, I am always on this show. I interview artists, you know, I interviewed Eden Lee. I always talk with artists about what it is that they do and how they do it. But what is most important to me is why they do it. Yes. And I think you're asking the same sort of questions that really speak to me. I'm always, I recognize the inherent value of art in my life. But it is very difficult to quantify, to qualify in any way. And particularly with what's going on, we've just come through a very difficult election period. This is probably the first election, was it the first election that you were really aware of what was going on? Yes. You don't get to vote yet? No, I did get to vote. Oh, you did? Okay. I did. And it was the first year that I think people around me, like other students were really involved, not involved in, but paying attention to as well. Yeah. And regardless of the way a person voted, there's been so much contention. I know a lot of people who have lost friends over it. And you've blocked people on Facebook and had difficult conversations at Thanksgiving or worked very hard to avoid conversations. That's a difficult thing for a country to go through. And we're working with a president-elect who is a wild card. And that may be exciting on one level of the spectrum. It's also very unsettling on the other level of the spectrum. They exist at the same time. We just had the wildfires in Tennessee, the incident at Ohio State University with a fellow who drove his car into trying to harm people and then got out of his car with a knife. And he was shot right in front of these students. There's a lot of crazy stuff going on right now. And I think more than ever, it's a good time to think about the importance of art. And to at least have these... If we can't put numbers to it, and for decades I've been trying to put numbers to it. It's part of my job to write grant proposals and try to say, this is why it's important. We know in students who study art and are involved in theater have higher test scores. They're more likely to go to college and they're more likely to graduate from college. That we can say. Once you become an adult, it's still important to you. Do you have artists in your family, anyone involved formally in art? My mom's parents were musicians. But it wasn't as much my family's involvement that sort of sparked me to want to do this. It wasn't their involvement, it was more their encouragement. When I was really little, my mom would read me these picture books of Shakespeare stories which started my knack for Shakespeare, which is what I do with Eden Lee and the older ensemble. I think it was my family's love of storytelling that got me involved with this. The younger generation of my family were all interested in it. My sister is doing the same stuff that I am and has been for a while. Wonderful. You were raised with an appreciation for it and an understanding that it's important. Your math scores are important as well, but it's a part of the quality of life. Tell me about your involvement in Eden Lee's classes before we go any further. How long have you been involved in them? This is my fifth year in the high school company. The year before I moved up I was in the junior ensemble. Right now there is a junior and intermediate ensemble. The juniors more for the younger side of middle school. They mainly do improv games and sort of start on the train to acting. In the intermediate we start off with shorter monologues then they then get longer ones. Next semester they are going to work on scenes. All contemporary and in the older group for the first part of the year we work with master class teachers and short Shakespeare scenes. The next part of the year we are going to be performing mid-summer night stream at HPU. Exciting. You are assisting her in the younger groups. What's involved with that? What are you doing? I am a part of the class. I do their activities with them. For the intermediate I hold a book for them when they perform their monologues. Sometimes I give them notes as well. Next semester when they start working on scenes there will be times where only two people will be working on their scene with Eden Lee and then everyone else will disperse and work on their own. I will shift between them to keep them on task and give my opinion on what they are doing and sort of help them keep going when they are not working with her. Do you hope to, and by the way those classes are happening in the theater while we are in the office. You guys are keeping everyone busy and engaged and under control. Which is always good. Where do you hope to go with this? Working with these classes helped me realize how much I like teaching because for a while I thought I am going to become an actor later in life but recently I have been sort of gearing towards getting a degree in education and this gave me validation that this is something that I enjoy and would like to do for the foreseeable future. Oh wow, well there you go, power of art right there. So at Mid-Pack you are not involved in theater there? No I am not because I had been, before I started at Mid-Pack I was involved in Eden Lee's programs and it is a big commitment to be in that group and we can't do shows at school outside of it because she wants your full commitment to the work that you are doing there so it was the choice between what I had already been doing and was already really committed to and had a passion for so I am not doing theater at Mid-Pack, a lot of my friends are and I see the work that they are doing and it is also really great. And do you enjoy going to the shows? To see shows also? Shows primarily at Mid-Pack or around the island also? Whatever I can find time for but I think the most recent show, aside from Death Trap at HP which I was a small part of, was that I saw was at Mid-Pack because they did Spelling V and my friend was one of the main characters so I went to support her at the school. Well and hey, especially when you work in theater I love to see theater but I don't get to see nearly as much as I want so I'm just asking to find out how actively do that and we have people who help to support Kumakuhua Theater who don't get to see most of our shows. They know that it's important and that's what we are going to get into and the second segment is the actual why we find it important. Okay, we are going to go to a commercial. We are going to go to a commercial. Right back with Breanne Johnson. I hope you will stick around for this conversation. Aloha everyone. I hope you've been watching Think Tech Hawaii but I'm here to invite you to watch me on Viva Hawaii every Monday at 3 p.m. I'm waiting for you. Mahalo. Aloha! Angus McDuck here on Think Tech Hawaii with my favorite show, Hibachi Talk. Every Friday from 1 to 1.30 p.m. Please join us with my good old buddy, Gordo the Texard and Andrew the security guy. And remember, let your wing gang free where there you be. How you doing? Aloha! Hello, my name is Crystal. Let me tell you my talk show, I'm all about health. It's healthy to talk about sex. It's healthy to talk about things that people don't talk about. It's healthy to discuss things that you think are unhealthy because you need to talk about it. So I welcome you to watch Quok Talk and engage in some provocative discussions on things that do relate to healthy issues and have a well-balanced attitude in life. Join me. Hi, we're back. We're live. This is Center Stage on the Think Tech Hawaii digital network. I'm your host Donna Blanchard, proud managing director of Kulu Kulu Theatre. If you would ever like to join us in our downtown studio audience here in Pioneer Plaza, you may do so. Just email Jay, that's J-A-Y at thinktechawai.com and he will hook you up. If you would ever like to be on the show or you know an artist who you'd really love to see on the show, just let me know. You can tweet me at, it's all about Donna. On Twitter, you can find me on Facebook, Donna.blanchard. I would love to hear from you. We're talking with Brienne Johnson, who is a student at Mid-Pacific Institute. We're not supposed to call them Mid-Pac anymore. It's Mid-Pacific Institute. Part of the impetus for this conversation, which I'm enjoying, I'm glad that we had this reason, was that you asked me some questions for a report that you're doing for your Hawaiian Studies program. Do you need to have these in writing or will this suffice? Oh, this will suffice, yeah. Okay, well then ask away. My first one was what do you enjoy most about your job? I enjoy, you'd think I would have prepared for that. You know what, I enjoy solving problems. And as managing director of a small theater, there are a lot of loose ends that need to be tied up into neat little bows all over the place. And I am an actor first. I have my BFA. I studied acting and pursued that career, but also had this business life on the side. And in managing a theater, I was able to sort of bring those two sides of my brain together in one job. So I'm supporting not only theater, it's theater of place, which I believe very firmly in, that it is important that we are telling our stories. It is vital that we believe in the importance of our stories. I mean, yours and mine. Anytime a story is told with honesty, our humanity resonates with other people, and that is community, and that is what we're all about. So I get to combine that part of my life with this, the business side of my brain that loves to solve problems and make things run smoothly, and then look for the next challenge. Gotta have the next challenge. So it's good for me to be working with a theater that's in a period of great growth. So there's always another mountain to climb. Yeah. There you go. Thank you. Now you can have your own interview show. Yeah. This is kind of a big question, but what are some of the reasons that you think it's important to support local theater? Do you have any thoughts on that? Why do you think it's important to support local theater rather than touring companies that come through? I think that it encourages community and growth in community, and I don't want to say it's more intimate, but it sort of is to know that this came from where I live. These are people that I could know, and I think that a lot of people here don't get as much shots as the people on touring company. Right. So it's definitely encouraging the jobs of people, or letting people who live here pursue their passion or continue pursuing their passion. Yeah. Yeah. And I like to say that if you're a Filipino actress and you audition for a theater in Chicago or for some of the theaters around here that do more off-Broadway work, then you're going to be playing, you may be playing a white person or any number of brown people. At Kumakahu Theater, you're going to get to play a Filipino woman. And I think that there is a place for all of us in the landscape of theater here, but there's an inherent value that comes along with being able to see people and stories that you really relate to on a stage. And the conversations that come afterwards, I think that's the most important part of any piece of art is the conversation that it leads to afterwards. And if you come see a Lee Kataluna show at Kumakahu Theater or our current show, Aihula, which is part hoike, part regular play, and the conversations that come out of that involve your childhood and your hopes and dreams and aspirations just because of the nature of our work. Thank you. Okay, sure. Do you think that the average person in today's society understands why this is important? No. I don't. I think that the average person who comes to Kumakahu Theater does. Yeah. And we're different because, you know, if you go to Diamond Head Theater or Manoa Valley, they both produce shows that they produce sort of headliner shows like Elf, I think last year or the year before that, Diamond Head did that, and it sold out every show. It sold out before it opened, and then it was extended, and I think it sold it. It's extension before it opened. And everybody knows the show of Elf. You know, I love the movie. And wants to, you know, Christmas cheer and all that. They want to be a part of it. Okay, so there's some glitz and glam that goes along that too. There are people who come to Kumakahu Theater know that most of our shows are brand new scripts. They're world premieres. They're still works in progress. It's like you're jumping into a pool and you have no idea what the temperature of the water is. And sometimes it may be colder than you like. Frankly, you know, when all of your shows are new, you're not going to necessarily like all of our shows, but we have people who support us and have been coming back for generations because they believe in the importance of what we do. Those people get it. Most people, I don't think they do. We're lucky enough to live in a city, in a state where any new public construction buildings have to devote, it's either 1% or 2% of their budget to art in their buildings. But I wonder how many people stop and look at, you know, really look at it. I think that when people come closest to really understanding the significance of art is when they do not have it in their lives for a time. And they may not still understand where the unrest comes from, but I think we will all naturally seek it in some way. And you can seek the experience by reading a good book or marathoning a show on Netflix. You have to, Picasso said, and I'm really loosely translating, quoting him, it was something like art shakes the dust of everyday life off of our feet. We have to do that somehow. So I wish that more people recognized the inherent value of it, but unfortunately I think that you have to be raised with it to really understand it or go through some sort of crisis or have an aha moment where you connect. I went to that art gallery or that show or that concert and I feel better now. Or I sang in the car at the top of my lungs and all of a sudden my day doesn't seem so bad anymore. I do that all the time. Sometimes I write a poem and I'm amazed by what comes out of me and then I feel better. How about you? Do you do anything like that? I definitely agree with the singing at the top of your lungs or writing a poem. And I don't know, recently during the summers I don't act very much. I write a lot, but I don't do a lot of acting and I sort of forget the joy that comes from it until I'm next on stage or next working with. I'm doing a 12-night scene right now with my scene partner and we had been running lines a lot and making sure that we hadn't memorized, we knew what all our words meant. But it was only when we were performing what we had for our director Eden Lee that I sort of remembered, this is why I do this, this joy and bliss that I get from expressing someone who isn't me and sharing it with someone else. That's why I want to act and why I enjoy acting. Yeah, I agree. And I don't get to spend as much time on stage as I used to just because when you're managing a theater it's a whole new world. But that made me start playing the ukulele and painting and doing, you find that outlet somewhere and then take those opportunities to be on stage when you can. I think that if you feel better when you do it, there's something within you that needs it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Do we have more? Are there any productions that you were a part of or watched at Kumakuhua that particularly stand out as not a favorite but one that you look back on and smile on when you look back at it? I've been in one show at Kumakuhua Theater and just because of the nature of the work, the theater of place, there aren't a lot of roles for people who look like me. But there literally was a role for a Midwest farmer's daughter, me, my age, everything in this show, written by Victor Roger. My name is Gary Cooper. It was a good show. It was a really wonderful experience. I had been off stage in a full-length production for about eight years, so I sort of needed to get back into it. And even at I have a long and full background of acting and I've played some amazing women and worked with some amazing artists and it is still humbling every time I do it. That was really nice. That was the show I was involved in. We did a show last year called Not One But Two that was written by Hanna E. E. Epstein, who was a meth addict herself, grew up on the North Shore, wrote a show that was an hour in the life of a woman who was a meth addict trying to recover, but she still was a dealer because that's how she made her money and her mom was an addict and all these different people who moved in and out of her life during that hour were there because of the drugs. And it was one of the most moving and difficult and thought-provoking and conversation-inspiring shows that I've ever had the privilege of being a part of or seeing. We survey our audiences after our shows and over 90% of the audience said that they didn't realize the impact of meth on the lives of all of us on the island and that they felt much more aware of what was going on and much more likely to want to be involved in helping people and helping to make sure that that's a subculture of our island and we want to help stop that. So that was definitely a favorite of mine. There are lots of others that I'm very proud of. I can imagine. I'm very proud to be able to be a part of them. Did you see that show? Did you see Not One But Two? No, I didn't. I wish I did now. Yeah, it was a good one. What shows have you seen, not necessarily at Kumu, that you feel were most moving for you? And I'm going to open that up to, it could be a movie, something that you feel was important in your life. It's hard to think of just one. There was something recently. I was going to say, what about Shakespeare? Recently I was a part of Othello that we did in Kauai Theatre last April, I believe it was. What's funny is a lot of times when I'm playing a role, I'll be excited to play whoever I'm cast as. Usually I really respect the character, but that was one of the times where as playing Amelia, I sort of realized a lot of her reactions are how I would react. And that made me sad when she died. Because originally I was like, yeah, I get to play a death scene. This is fun. And then the characters almost felt like real people as we reached the end of each show. And I was more moved than I thought I would be. That is awesome. That is awesome. You really connected to art and the character that you're playing. And I bet you did an awesome job. Sorry I missed it. And that's all we got. We got to wrap up the show. Thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. Thank you for being here with us on center stage. There's a few people here in the studio I would like to thank Robert McLean, our floor manager who's right over there. Thank you. Zuri Bender, our studio overlord who is in my ear telling me I got to wrap it up. And Jay Fiedel, who somehow manages to put all of this together. We will see you next week. It'll be my last show of 2016. We will have Eden Lee Murray here and her husband, Roger. And we will be talking about their involvement in part of the important role they play in. We'll see you next week on Sensei Channel.