COURTESY PHOTO Loretta Ables Sayre in a scene from the Lincoln Center Theater production of Rodgers & Hammerstein's "South Pacific."

Tony Award nomination for Hawaii actress

Hawaii entertainer Loretta Ables Sayre has been nominated for a Tony Award.

The singer and actress won the nod in the Featured Actress-Musical category for her performance as Bloody Mary in "South Pacific," now playing at Broadway's Lincoln Theater.

The lush revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein's classic took 11 nominations, second only to "In the Heights," a snapshot of Latino life in Upper Manhattan, which earned 13 Tony Award nominations today.

Ables Sayre is a veteran of the local stage, with a career that began in 1979 when she started singing in Keola and Kapono Beamer's act. Her resume includes many roles in community theater, commercials and television, her most familiar was probably as Loretta the waitress in Bank of Hawaii's old "Harry and Myra"? commercials.

"It's always been a dream of mine to perform in a Broadway show, but something that seems unattainable living in Hawaii," Ables Sayre said when "South Pacific"? opened in April.

Tony Award winners will be announced June 15 in a three-hour CBS telecast from Radio City Music Hall.