Mike Burley / mburley@starbulletin.com Contestants participated in a rehearsal of the game show "Wheel of Fortune" last night before filming at the Hilton Waikoloa Village near Kailua-Kona on the Big Island.

Big Isle, big ‘Wheel’

Filming begins at the Hilton Waikoloa Village before 1,200 audience members

WAIKOLOA » The audience was pumped up, the contestants were pumped up and the state's economy will soon be pumped up as "Wheel of Fortune" began taping 20 shows on the Big Island last night, to air beginning Nov. 5.

The Traditions Hawaii hula halau opened the show. Palm trees rimmed the outdoor stage. The little bay at the Hilton Waikoloa Village served as a backdrop.

And "Hawaii's Big Island" splashed across the overhead screens, leaving no doubt where the taping was happening.

The shows will be seen by up to 15 million viewers a night. About 250 American and Asian convention planners were seated in the audience, part of a convention of business meeting planners called PRIME, ready to carry the message of "Wheel of Fortune" and the Big Island back to two continents.

The audience chanted the familiar opening, "Wheel ... of ... Fortune!"

And seated in a wheelchair in the front row was Florencio Alegre, a month short of his 101st birthday, along with his grandson Steve McPeek and his great-grandson Michel McPeek.

Ask host Pat Sajak how "Wheel" has remained so popular for 26 years, and he says at first that he doesn't know.

"As close as I am to the show, I still don't get it," he said in an interview.

But later comments revealed he has a pretty good idea why "Wheel" is the No. 1 syndicated television show in the nation.

Mike Burley / mburley@starbulletin.com Contestants Mike Droscoski, left, and Stephanie Kagawa applauded last night as Nancy McKee raised her arms in celebration next to host Pat Sajak during the filming of "Wheel of Fortune."

"We're sort of a safe haven" that the whole family can watch together, he said.

The whole family, like 100-year-old Alegre and the McPeeks, who watch the show at home in Kukuihaele, a tiny town perched on the rim of the Big Island's Waipio Valley.

Michel, 11, says he watches because it's on at dinner time. "I have no choice," he said. But he is watching.

Vanna White, the glamorous, nearly silent partner who turns over letters during the show, said she and Pat are onstage working just 35 days a year. The rest of the time, she is the mother of a 14-year-old son and an 11-year-old daughter.

Being a TV star "allows me to have a normal life," she said in a pre-show interview. "I bake cookies. I drive my kids to school. I carpool."

A South Carolina native, she retains a trace of a Southern accent and a Southern wish for her children to grow up with values. "I want them to be polite and kind," she said.

Now it's show time.

Stage manager John Lauderdale gets the audience pumped up. "Fifteen seconds, folks. Excited?"

Yes! "Wheel ... of ... Fortune!"

Out come the contestants for the first taping: Mike Droscoski, a property manager from Holualoa in West Hawaii; Stephanie Kagawa, an elementary school teacher from Pahoa on the other side of the island; and Nancy McKee, a credit and collection agent from Kaneohe. She also does kickboxing.

And how well do they do? That's a secret known only by the 1,200 people seated in the seaside audience.