Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

By George F. Lee, Star-Bulletin
Martin Romualdez, left, is Daniel, and Jeaneen Tang is Phoebe
in Kumu Kahua's production of "The Season of Yellow Ginger."

In full bloom

First-time Hawaii playwright
Margaret Jones uses local characters
to tell a universal tale of family, identity,
obsession and true romance in
'The Season of Yellow Ginger.'

By Stephanie Kendrick
Assistant Features Editor
Star-Bulletin

IT may be wrong for school teachers to pick favorites, but playwrights are allowed, and Margaret Jones has hers.

As an actor, the part she covets in her first play, "The Season of Yellow Ginger," is Levi. "It was a gift to be able to write that character," she says.

The only problem is Levi is a grandfather and Jones is a 33-year-old woman. But the attraction is understandable. Levi is a feisty retired carpenter coping with the onset of Alzheimer's. He has a ready wit and he knows what he likes -- his pipe, his magazines and his sweet Hawaiian-Portuguese wahine.

THE SEASON OF YELLOW GINGER When: 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays, from today through Feb. 6 Where: Kumu Kahua Theatre Tickets: $12 general for Thursday shows, $15 general for Friday-Sunday shows. Discounts available for groups, seniors, students and the unemployed. Box office hours are 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Monday through Saturday, or charge by phone at 536-4441 Info: 536-4222

"Yellow Ginger" tells the story of Levi and his mainland-raised grandson, Daniel. "The grandfather seems to be losing his identity while the grandson is finding his identity," says Jones.

Personal experience and research helped her create a character with Alzheimer's. She watched the onset of senility in her grandfather 10 years ago and she was touched and inspired by an article in Life magazine about a brilliant engineer whose life had been so transformed by the disease that all the items in his house were labeled with Post-it notes.

While the bulk of the drama focuses on Daniel's infatuation with his cousin Sarah, the true romance in the story is the marriage of Levi and Moana. There again, Jones drew on personal experience. "I'm blessed to have so many role models of that generation. They're so feisty and they're so loving," she says.

By George F. Lee, Star-Bulletin
Nyla Ching-Fuji is Moana and Dann Seki is Levi,
grandfather of Daniel and facing the onset
of Alzeihmer's.

While happy marriages are a rare dramatic device, it works in the case of Jones' play.

"A lot of drama has to be about negativity. My negativity comes elsewhere in the play," she says. "I needed to juxtapose this beautiful love with this forbidden love that Daniel can't handle."

"The Season of Yellow Ginger" is on stage tonight through Feb. 6 at Kumu Kahua Theatre. While it is a play about family, it is not family entertainment.

The second graders Jones teaches at Kaneohe Elementary will not be attending. In fact, the playwright doesn't recommend the production to anyone under 16. It explores mature issues and situations, including an uproariously funny scene in a strip club.

"I wanted to write a play that had a universal theme, that could take place anywhere in the world, but it just happens to be that they're Hawaiian and it takes place in Hawaii," says Jones. A graduate of Kamehameha Schools, Jones didn't feel qualified to tackle the political issues common to modern local literature. "What I knew I could write about was family," she says.

By George F. Lee, Star-Bulletin
Margaret Jones, left, playwright of "Yellow Ginger"
and Director Harry Wong.

Harry Wong, artistic director of Kumu Kahua and director of "Yellow Ginger," sees that as one of the promising things about Jones' work. "It's the next step in the development of Hawaiian writers to be able to write about issues that are not necessarily Hawaiian issues," he says.

Jones credits Wong with bringing "Yellow Ginger" to the stage.

She wrote the play about four years ago, put it on a shelf and didn't show it to anyone but family. Wong, an old college friend, got wind of the play and asked to read it.

"He said, 'You know what sucks about this play?' That it's too hokey? 'That you don't want to produce it,' " says Jones.

Next, the real work began.

While Jones is no stranger to the theater, having acted in several Kumu Kahua productions, she says input from Wong and the cast have resulted in a busy spate of rewriting in an effort to better translate the play to the stage.

She cut a hospital scene, for example, to minimize the set. She cut phone scenes after realizing it was boring to watch people talk on the phone. And the cast has added an energy to the enterprise that often translates into humor.

In fact, for a play about degenerative illness and forbidden love, "The Season of Yellow Ginger" is surprisingly funny.

Even in the midst of tragedy, there is often humor, says Wong. "It's the juxtaposition to the sadness but it's also a remedy for it."

Click for online
calendars and events.