Harriet Bouslog,
legal-eagle Robin Hood
of Hawaii, comes
to life in KHET bio
What an extraordinary person Harriet Bouslog was, and her life leaps into focus with this documentary, one of the final installments of the "Biography Hawaii" series produced by KHET.
Bouslog was, apparently, one grand and glorious pain in the okole for Hawaii's power elite. One of the territory's first female lawyers, she represented the ILWU during the red-baiting '40s and '50s, deliberately threw her considerable legal expertise behind the defense of those who needed it most -- the poor and peripheral -- and was instrumental in seeking justice in the notorious "Hawaii Seven" case, the Majors/ Palakiko capitol punishment farce, and the hugely unjust John and Aiko Reinecke vs. Board of Education case.
"Harriet Bouslog"
8 p.m. tonight and
9 p.m. Saturday on
KHET/PBS-Hawaii
Whew. But that's not all. In the midst of fighting the good fight for others, she lost her license to practice law in Hawaii, thanks to an arbitrary ruling by the Hawaii State Bar Association, at the time largely comprising corporate counsels for the Big Five. Lawyers for unpopular causes, they said, do not have the right of free speech. Bouslog appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and won, setting legal precedent still in place today.
And Bouslog was a hoot -- a vivacious, boozy broad with a quick wit and an even keener sense of when not to wear underwear in court.
All of this is shoehorned into an eye-opening hour of excellent documentary filmmaking, with the high production standards we've come to expect from KHET. The script is by Victoria Nalani Kneubuhl, production and direction is by Joy Chong-Stannard and scholarship by Craig Howes. Actress Bridget Kelly plays Bouslog in some transition sequences.
The work is generally superb, if a bit focused on the legal battles. I wish there were more information on Bouslog's personal life, such as what her second husband did for a living, and there are photographs of her campaigning for some government office that simply aren't explained.
This is just the sort of unusual, quality work that picks up regional Emmys, illuminated as it is by moral clarity and pure storytelling ability. Alas, KHET is scuttling both its original-production capabilities and talented personnel as it prepares to flee the University of Hawaii. It's alarming to think this may be one of the last documentaries to be produced by the station.
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