Wood Craft
IT was a warm kamaaina gathering, full of aloha, that turned out for the opening of Laurie Breeden Callies' exhibition of hand-colored photos of children Monday at Canon Photo Gallery. Husband-wife attorneys John Barkai and Linda Martell arrived with 9-month-old twins, Leah and Hope, dressed in pumpkin costume pajamas. Since the costumes were expensive, the parents said the twins will wear them often, not just on Halloween. Roy's slack-key guitarist-singer Bobby Moderow performed for lei-covered Laurie and the crowd. That was fitting, as Laurie's cousin was the late slack-key master Sonny Chillingworth. Weeks ago, Bobby and a couple of musicians were on Kahala beach to take photos for a CD when they came upon Laurie taking pictures. Seeing the musicians needed help, she did the photo work free. Monday, Bobby called Laurie and volunteered to play for her show free. That's what aloha is all about. Besides the Moderow CD, Laurie's Baby Face Productions did the photos for Eric Gilliom's upcoming CD, "Chow Fun" ... Aloha pictured at
photo exhibit
Lexus motors to Kapiolani
So, Servco CEO Mark Fukunaga walks up to a group at the new Lexus building and says: "What do Bill Gates, Dennis Rodman, Nicolas Cage and Calista Flockhart have in common?" Right. They all drive a Lexus. More than 1,000 lesser-known Lexus owners packed the new showroom and service center on Kapiolani Thursday night to look it over and enjoy food and beverage by Beau Soleil and music by Kit Samson's group. Kit had vocalist Sina Foley and musicians Butch Nicolas, Steve Jones and Rocky Holmes with him. "We're happy to have a facility such as this to serve our customers," Fukunaga said. Also pleased with the larger facility were Lexus G.M. Leighton Migita, service manager Kevin Honda and Servco officers Curtis Lee, Ed Shikata and Andrew Nakano ...There is already talk of Academy Award nominations for "American Beauty" stars Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening. Both deserve them. The entire cast of this dark comedy is exceptional. Spacey is an ad man bummed out about his life and does something about it. Bening is a ditzy real estate agent. I know at least one of those ... Action actor Mario Van Peebles took in "Miss Saigon" Thursday night and was given a backstage tour after the show ...
The isle Neiman Marcus store will be one of 11 stores nationwide to have the Traveling Men's Formal Caravan. Formal wear ranging from shoes to top hats will be included in the Caravan, which checks in at the Ala Moana store Thursday and runs through Sunday. Men's evening wear by top makers will be on view, including, get this: a Gieves and Hawkes of London Hussars tunic, one of only four made, for just $7,495. At that price a band of Hussars ought to come with it ... Men's wear, along with women's, is included in the Kahala Mandarin's fashion show Thursday ...
Choir boys get together
The Honolulu Boy Choir greeted the Vienna Choir Boys in Gateway Park last weekend. The local boys wore aloha shirts and slippers and the visitors, who gave concerts in the Hawaii Theatre, wore woolen attire and shoes. The islanders sang a blessing in Hawaiian for the Austrians and gave them ginger leis ...
Ben Wood, who sold the Star-Bulletin in the streets
of downtown Honolulu during World War II, writes of
people, places and things every Saturday.
E-mail him at bwood@starbulletin.com