‘Five-0’ fanatics

Four friends who share a love for actor Alex O’loughlin hope to spot him during their series-inspired visit

There will be plenty of action and drama when the screen lights up Saturday with this year’s Sunset on the Beach premiere of “Hawaii Five-0,” but the best story arc of the second season will belong to four women in the audience.

Until their flights landed in Honolulu Thursday, they had never met in person. But they’re spending seven days together in Hawaii as part of the “Five-0” celebration — meeting other fans at the screening, touring locations where episodes were shot and, if they’re lucky, posing for photographs with some of the show’s stars.

Stacey Jonson, Madaline O’Connor, Ellen Swedberg and Debby Young first met six months ago on Twitter when they plugged into the CBS series’ social media universe. In the beginning, they talked only about plots, character development and, of course, how much of a hunk they thought Alex O’Loughlin was in his role as Steve McGarrett.

But it quickly grew into something more. Now they can’t imagine a day without connecting via Twitter, Facebook, Skype or telephone.

And they’re on the loose in Hawaii. They’re the ones with the homemade buttons that read “Alexoholic” and “Free McGarrett.”

THE WOMEN were fans of the show right from the start and some even before it first aired a year ago because they were fans of O’Loughlin, who starred as a doctor in “Three Rivers” and as a vampire detective in “Moonlight,” both CBS series.

“When he signed on to do this show I wasn’t going to miss it,” Jonson said. “I have watched every single episode of everything he has been in.”

Jonson, who watches episodes on her iPad during her lunch hour, initially planned to visit Hawaii last spring with the hopes she might bump into a “Five-0” film crew.

“Then when I got online and started meeting people and we really started talking about Sunset on the Beach and people got excited, that was when I decided to do this,” she said. “This just sounded like way more fun than going there all by myself.”

Swedberg actually met O’Loughlin at a gallery opening in Los Angeles in May. When she initially called about the event, someone accidentally put Swedberg on a private party guest list, but she didn’t realize it until she entered the gallery and found only four other people there — including the Australian actor.

Her friend Young sent phone texts during the encounter reminding her to breathe. “I told her to take a deep breath and relax,” Young said. “And to remember every detail and tell me about it.”

It made Swedberg want to come to Sunset on the Beach even more. “My family, you realize, thinks I’m crazy,” she said.

When Swedberg told her husband she wanted to come to Hawaii, he reminded her that she had two sons in college. Her response: eBay. She sold attic treasures, old movies like her “Bridges of Madison County” DVD, a Dobby bobblehead from “Harry Potter” that fetched $17, and $100 quilts she made herself.

“I am not apologizing to anyone for this,” Swedberg said. “I earned my money.”

The four new friends joined a special fan tour organized by Bruce Fisher, owner of Hawaii Aloha Travel. He has 65 fans coming from as far away as Hungary to attend a Tweetup, luau, the screening and a tour of episode locations. Other fan groups are coming, too, he said.

“There is a whole group from Germany that is coming because they are fans of Alex O’Loughlin,” Fisher said. “It’s all women. They are just trying to find Alex. I think there are 30 of them.”

Although it’s not on the tour itinerary, Jonson, O’Connor, Swedberg and Young are hoping they’ll meet O’Loughlin as well.

“We want to thank him for this crazy, wild ride,” Swedberg said.

They’ll be traveling with a homemade Hawaiian quilt Swedberg created using pieces each woman contributed. They sent letters about the quilt to the show but there hasn’t been a response, Swedberg said.

“We’re not crazy and we’re not stalkers,” she said. “If it comes to it, we will leave the quilt at the production offices. But then you will have four women who will cry all the way to the airport.”