There will be several Hawaiʻi Opera Theatre debuts this week, including one for teenager Flash Inouye, who plays Danny Torrance in “The Shining,” which is based on the best-selling novel by Stephen King.
The production is the work of Composer Paul Moravec and Librettist Mark Campbell. Directed and conducted by the husband-and-wife team of Brian Staufenbiel and Nicole Paiement of the San Francisco-based Opera Parallèle, the approximately two-hour opera also features Joshua Jeremiah as Jack Torrance, Rebecca Cox as Wendy Torrance and Robert Feng as Dick Hallorann. The production marks a debut for its conductor and director, as well as Cox and Inouye.
Catch the performances at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 30, and 4 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 1, at the Neal S. Blaisdell Concert Hall. Tickets start at $35. Details.
“It's such a unique production,” said Lance Inouye, who is Flash’s father and the resident conductor and artistic advisor of Hawaiʻi Opera Theatre. “One of the interesting things about this is the way the whole stage and the production sort of transforms you and brings you into the world of this eerie, haunted hotel.”
To rehearse for the opera, singers and a pianist initially practice separately from the Hawaiʻi Symphony Orchestra before the groups come together. Recently, while Paiement was conducting the Hawaiʻi Symphony Orchestra, Inouye conducted a rehearsal of the singers with the pianist occurring at the same time.
“That was just so special for me to be able to conduct something that my kid is in,” he said. “It was really great.”
The opera is sung in English and will have supertitles.
The story explores what happens when Jack Torrance and his wife, Wendy, and their son, Danny, become caretakers of a hotel in a remote part of the Colorado Rockies and have spooky encounters with the supernatural.
The production uses music, orchestration and projections to bring the story to life.
“The way the set works is — you really feel like the hotel is alive in an eerie sort of way,” Lance Inouye said. “There's all kinds of hallucinations that go on. And again, that's done musically and with lighting projections and everything. It really brings you into this world as an audience member.”
Flash, who just turned 13 years old, plays Danny Torrance, a boy who possesses a second sense, or the shining, and can see the supernatural. It’s a role the teenager played almost two years ago at Portland Opera in Portland, Oregon.
“He really understands the process of how an opera is put together,” his father added. “You start out with just a sing through, and then you work on the staging scene by scene, and things get layered. You add in the orchestra. You add in the costumes, the lighting, the makeup further along. The last few days have been getting more and more exciting because they're putting the final touches on.”
Tonight is the dress rehearsal with an audience, he added.
A few days ago, his son celebrated his first birthday as a teenager.
“That was extra special because the whole cast got to sing ʻHappy Birthday’ to him,” he said. “And if you have a cast of professional opera singers singing ʻHappy Birthday,’ I mean, what could be better?”
He laughs.
“As far as this production, it's being staged and conducted in such an incredible way that it really transports you as an audience member into this world that's very eerie and unpredictable,” Lance Inouye said. “It really shows you the power of opera and of the performing arts to just transport you.”
Stephen King’s horror novel, which inspired the opera, will celebrate its 50th anniversary in January of 2027. This production falls just a few months ahead of that date.
“One of the main things I like to tell people is opera is not just one thing,” he added.
Recently, Lance Inouye conducted the world premiere of “Kamalehua: The Sheltering Tree,” which was performed almost entirely in ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi and featured baritone Quinn Kelsey.
This opera is a theatrical piece that combines poetry, music, moment and light, he said, adding, "The magic of opera is that it can really put you in a different world."
Katie Helland can be reached at katie@alohastatedaily.com.
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