In March I wrote about the original “Hawaii Five-0,” which ran from 1968 to 1980. Several readers told me about their experiences with the long-running TV show.
Extra! Extra!
An anonymous reader said, “In the early 1970s we all wanted to be ‘extras’ or even have small speaking parts on ‘Hawaii Five-0.’ I went to the casting office with dreams of stardom.
“And after trying out, I WAITED, and WAITED, and WAITED, probably a year. I finally got a call back to be an extra, now referred to as ‘background actor,’ on an episode being filmed at the Ilikai.
“It was during a break at UH, so off I went. I was told to bring two changes of clothes for different scenes I’d be in.
“There were only a few of us younger people there, and the fellow I sat next to and chatted with while waiting, and waiting, in the main lobby — I can visualize it so clearly — had recently arrived from Michigan.
“His name was Michael W. Perry! Nice guy. Great voice.
“We did the first scene side by side, walking back and forth in front of the main entrance as cars were filmed driving up.”
The episode was called “The $100,000 Nickel.” It was about a forger altering a 1903 Liberty Head five-cent piece to look like a very rare 1913 nickel worth $100,000 in real life. That same nickel sold for $3.3 million in 2014.
“I parked on Hobron Lane, steps from Ala Moana Boulevard, thinking for sure I’d be finished by whenever the no-parking time began.
“Nope. They wanted me in another background shot, the third that day, and it was already dark, and this last one was with some of the principal actors directly behind my back, within inches.
“We were told not to look anywhere but the ‘coin’ showcases we were viewing during the filming, so I only saw them from a distance while they set up the scene.
“I was there for something like 14 hours. I got to where I’d parked my adorable Datsun pickup truck and it was GONE!
“No cellphones, no one around, no phone booths … scary. There was a liquor store on the corner.
“Somehow, I got hold of a police officer and found out my car was towed for being in a no-parking zone and impounded. The impound fee? Something like $120!
“So, my big star turn that earned me $35 as an extra ended up being one of the worst days ever trying to track my ‘stolen car’ down.
“I never did it again. But I was able to see myself in the episode, if I didn’t blink, and it was great in retrospect!
“Overall, I have no regrets and (almost all) great memories of my day ‘on set’ in an episode of ‘Hawaii Five-0.’
“How cool is that?”
‘Hawaii Five-0’
Nery Heenan said “Hawaii Five-0” literally lured her family to Hawaii about 50 years ago!
“While watching Jack Lord and the amazing island scenery from our home in Westchester County, N.Y., especially during the winter, Dave (Heenan) would tell our young boys and me, ‘Don’t worry, we will move to Hawaii one of these days’ … and we did in 1975!
“One of my new friends here, Pam Loper, is the sister-in-law of ‘Five-0’s’ casting director, Dick Kindelon.
“She took me to a filming one day at the Hale Koa Hotel with a promise of $50 plus a bento lunch for a day’s work!
“We were part of a group of worried onlookers, watching a man with explosives strapped to his chest demanding to see the governor of Hawaii, while Steve McGarrett negotiated with him.”
Heenan said she missed the TV show when it aired because she was in the Philippines. “While there, I got a call from Dave saying he just saw it and saw me in my red Princess Kaiulani muumuu in the crowd. I’ve still never seen it.”
Nery’s husband, Dave Heenan, by the way, was CEO of Theo Davies, a trustee of the Campbell Estate and dean of the Shidler College of Business, as well as being a prolific author.
Martin Sheen and son
“I have a number of ‘Five-0’ stories,” Geoff Heise told me. He has over 20 local acting credits.
“One is from the first ‘Five-0’ role in 1978. I played a bodyguard for a crooked lawyer.
“The crooked lawyer part was played by an up-and-coming young actor brought in from Hollywood, Martin Sheen. He was sometimes accompanied by a cute, albeit rather rascally young boy named Charlie, his son, who was about 8 years of age.
“Martin was very professional and made it easy for me (a novice at the time) to feel very comfortable. I could tell he had a ‘presence’ and that I would probably be seeing him on the screen again in the future.
“The episode was replayed again a few weeks ago, and my granddaughter, Lia, chuckled at my ‘serious sideburns.’”
Charlie Sheen, for those who don’t know, followed in dad’s footsteps and had a few acting roles (“Platoon,” “Two and a Half Men,” “Spin City”) but never lost that rascally side of his personality.
Clothing problems
Ron Augustine told me he had two experiences with Jack Lord that both involved problematic clothing.
“I was in an elevator in the Amfac Center. The door opened, and Jack Lord stepped in with his wife.
“He stood right in front of me, and I was looking at his back. He wore a very stylish coat, with two sculptured double-stitched curved seams on the back.
“Apparently, he hadn’t worn it in a while, and hadn’t bothered to look it over before putting it on. The stitches were all frayed with loose threads popping out everywhere. This was way before the days of cellphone cameras, or I would have had a classic photo to show around.”
Augustine said he was later at a party that businessman Don Over threw for a bunch of notables.
“A railing on the lanai had just recently been painted. Jack Lord showed up and briefly sat on the railing. You can probably guess what happened next!
“He walked around all night with two huge green wet paint stripes on the back of his pants, and nobody had the nerve to tell him about it.”
Stoney Burke
Steve Miura said that before Lord played Steve McGarrett in “Hawaii Five-0,” he was the star of “Stoney Burke,” which ran for one season from 1962 to 1963.
On Nov. 23, 1962, Lord and his wife, Marie, arrived in Hawaii to make an appearance at the Miss K-POI Pageant, held at the Honolulu Civic Auditorium. Tom Moffatt was the emcee.
“Jack came on stage wearing a cowboy outfit and carrying a saddle. After the event was over, Moffatt offered to give Jack a ride back to his hotel in Waikiki.
“When they got within a few blocks of his hotel, Jack got out of the car and insisted on walking the rest of the way,” Moffatt said. “Along the way back to his hotel on Kalakaua Avenue, Jack, who was still wearing his cowboy outfit and carrying his saddle, stopped to talk with fans and sign autographs.”
Outro
At the end of each of the original “Hawaii Five-0” episodes is the “outro,” which is a 30-second closing piece. The credits roll, and in the background are six men paddling a canoe with Diamond Head in the background.
The first man in the canoe is Pat Spencer, followed by Billy Mitchell, Frank Crozier, Jon Haneberg, Aka Hemmings and Tommy Holmes, the steersman.
“We were hired through the Outrigger Canoe Club,” Spencer says. “The club had a bunch of canoes that we could use.
“We took one out and just paddled off of Waikiki. The camera people were in a power boat telling us what to do. They shot us paddling from different angles.
“From beginning to end, it took only a few hours to film,” Spencer told me. They were paid $900 (in 2023 dollars).
They didn’t know, at the time that “Hawaii Five-0” would be seen by millions of people. How does Spencer feel about it now?
“Because it was a local show that developed some international acclaim,” Spencer says, “being in it made me feel I was a part of the community, which was everything, growing up here. It was really nice to have that experience. It seems like yesterday, but it was over 55 years ago.”
“The six of us were brought together by that experience but have not had a conversation about it since. It’s something that continues to connect us and collect us, in what’s become an amazing piece of history.”
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Bob Sigall writes the Rearview Mirror column every Friday. Send your comments or suggestions to Sigall@Yahoo.com.
