Light Show

Wednesday, December 18, 2002

BY JOHN BERGER
HONOLULU STAR - BULLETIN
    
Many interesting things have been banned from local school campuses in recent years -- POGs, Pokemon cards, spaghetti-strap tops and that song by Na Leo that mentions "the Lord," to name four. By this time next year, Slingerzz will almost certainly have been added to the list.

Never heard of Slingerzz? They go on sale in Hawaii tomorrow when "LUMA: Theatre of Light" opens at the Hawaii Theatre. Marlin, the single-name creator of "LUMA," also invented Slingerzz, and he had some with him when we met at Compadres on Monday to talk about the show. Marlin didn't bring out the Slingerzz until after the interview was over. The fun began when he did.

Slingerzz are among those extremely simple, why-didn't-I-think-of-this? toys -- coils of flexible lime-green tubing, each with a straight 5-inch-long handle. In theory, they're easy to use, but require some practice to master. Marlin made it look deceptively easy as he slung one so that the end wrapped so tightly around a chair leg that he could pull the chair to him. Then he threw one so that it wrapped around an object several yards away, and slung another around his outstretched fingers to create geometric patterns familiar to yo-yo aficionados.

Promoter Tim Bostock and I were far less adept. People watching from across the restaurant were fascinated anyway.

Marlin said "LUMA" offers a similar sense of involvement and entertainment.

" The audience has the opportunity to play with some of the illuminated objects that we're using," he said. "We also break the fourth wall a lot where we come off the stage and out into the house with some of the effects."

" LUMA," by the way, combines light, illuminated objects and an eclectic musical score to create a three-dimensional light show of striking images. Some are simply swirls of bright colors in the darkness. Others create the illusion of figures and forms moving or changing shape. The objects are manipulated by black-clad cast members whose garb includes a full-face hood with gauze-covered eyeholes. Marlin acknowledges that there's a definite element of danger involved in working on stage.

" You're moving around rapidly, there's other people moving around rapidly, there's things flying around that you have to be able to track and you're looking through a screen the whole time -- in the dark -- so it's dangerous. There've been some pretty hearty knocks -- broken noses, bloody lips."

Marlin got the idea of doing a show with light while watching a lava flow on the side of Kilauea, and developed it with additional creative input from friends with experience in circus, theater and electrical design. "When I came to Hawaii (in the late 1980s), I was playing with light. But it was while standing on the lava flow that I actually had the bolt-of-lightning epiphany about doing a whole show around it. It started to develop on the Big Island under different titles and has definitely been evolving, and continues to do so with new technology being added to it."

" LUMA" has played Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.; been seen on "The Tonight Show"; and entertained audiences in locales as diverse as Japan, India, the Netherlands and Scotland.

" (The show) is very specifically an American innovation because there's so much innovative technology in it, but we've all played with light and each culture has its own way of using it to amuse, to celebrate (and) recognize auspicious occasions. We're taking that innocent fascination with light that we all have ... and expanding it into an orchestration of light. It's an unforgettable experience.

" What makes this particular engagement so important to me is that the work was birthed here, it's gone around the world, and now it's coming home for the first time," he said. "That's very exciting for me."

And as for those Slingerzz, they'll be available during intermission during the show's run and coming, sooner or later, to a store near you.