JAMM AQUINO / JAQUINO@STARBULLETIN.COM Friends, relatives and supporters of late playwright Lisa Matsumoto gathered and greeted one another in the lobby yesterday prior to a memorial at the First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu at Koolau Golf Course.

Writer’s theater ‘ohana’ attend Matsumoto funeral

Those who loved acclaimed local playwright Lisa Matsumoto streamed into a packed Kaneohe church yesterday to celebrate her life.

Some 800 people were expected to attend the ceremony at the First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu at Koolau Golf Club in Kaneohe, said family spokesman Devon Nekoba.

"She was a family person, and it shows in a day like today," he said. "She made us all feel like family."

Matsumoto, 43, died Dec. 14 in a head-on collision while driving the wrong way in the westbound lanes of H-1 freeway near Houghtailing Street. Police still have not discovered where Matsumoto got onto the freeway or how she ended up heading the wrong way.

Cassie Olaivar, the 35-year-old woman Matsumoto hit, sustained a broken right leg and ankle and received nine staples in her head. She has since left the hospital.

An autopsy revealed later that "acute alcohol intoxication" was a significant factor in Matsumoto's death.

"Lisa created this extended family, this ohana that she envisioned -- Lisa's World -- that she created in her shows and in her life," Nekoba said. "Everybody here has been touched by her life in one shape or form."

JAMM AQUINO / JAQUINO@STARBULLETIN.COM Members of the musical group Chant -- Fred Li, left, Tanner Henderson, Pi'i Chris-Miguel, Vergel Jepas and Charles Timtim -- rehearsed the song "The Greatest Fan," which they wrote and performed for a play by Lisa Matsumoto, prior to Matsumoto's funeral yesterday at the First Presbyterian Church of Honolulu in the Koolau Golf Course Club House. The group thought it would be fitting to pay tribute to her with a performance. "She gave us a lot," remembered guitarist Jepas. The service, which was closed to the media, had hundreds of friends, relatives and acquaintances pay their respects to Matsumoto and her family. Matsumoto died last month in a wrong-way freeway crash.

Mathias Maas of Manoa met Matsumoto while working with her on a theater production.

"She really did have ohana. Everyone who worked there (on the production) was so family. She looked after everybody," he said. "That's what's so tragic. Hopefully, the family will stay together some other way."

One family that Matsumoto created was Ohia Productions, a nonprofit organization that produces shows for children and families, which she co-founded in 1995. She also penned the musical trilogy "Once Upon One Time," "Once Upon One Noddah Time" and "Happily Eva After."

Local actress Lisa Konove said Matsumoto was creative and had the potential to bring her talent to the mainland.

"There was a lot of people that were going to be touched by (her work)," she said.

A revised version of Matsumoto's musical "On Dragonfly Wings," inspired by the life of 3-year-old cancer victim Alana Dung, will be performed at Georgia Southern University in April.

"A lot of people on these islands in theater just come and go," said Maas, who attended the service with Konove. "That wasn't her way."