Giant Tiki on Broadway - 1961 - with video clip! - General Tiki

I ikitnrev Tiki Socialite D.C. / Virginia Joined: Jul 27, 2002 Posts: 1325	I ikitnrev Posted posted on Thu, Jul 31, 2008 11:20 PM One of the local tiki folks here in DC, artist Jared Davis, works as a theater set designer. He recently found the following amazing image in one of his textbooks -- "Scenery for the Theater" by Harold Burris-Meyer and Edward C. Cole (1971) -- This giant tiki was from a Broadway show called 'Thirteen Daughters' - the first Broadway musical set in Hawaii - and a flop that played for only 3 weeks (25 performances) from March 5 -23, 1961. The show was ready to close after only one week, but a woman who was friends with the producer invested an additional $75,000 in the show ... and promptly departed for Europe! The show closed two weeks later, and one month later the Tiki Ti opened! (no relation between the two events) The Broadway show starred Don Ameche and Ed Kenney. The review from Time Magazine (dated March 10, 1961) is amusing --- the play gets lame reviews, until the last line, where the set design is praised for its elegance. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,826951,00.html The NY Times review didn't exactly praise the show either. The last sentence of that review said 'But Hawaii will have to console itself with the thought that it took Oklahoma a few decades after achieving statehood to get a musical and song worthy of its pride." The set designer, George Jenkins, was nominated for a Tony for this work, along with the show's musical director, but they both lost out to the people who did Camelot that year. Bye Bye Birdie was also a big Tony winning musical that year. One year earlier, Jenkins also did the set design for the play 'The Miracle Worker' (starring Anne Bancroft) which was also nominated for a Tony award. The playwright, Eaton Magoo Jr., was born and raised in Hawaii. He did a couple of other Broadway shows in the 1970's, one called 'Aloha' and the other 'Heathen' Amazingly, a video clip of 'Thirteen Daughters' still exists - the cast performed a song/dance routine on the Ed Sullivan show on March 5, 1961 Unfortunately, the giant tiki didn't make the trip to the TV studio, but you do get sailors chasing Hula Girls. http://www.bluegobo.com/production.php?var=10189 The whole synopsis of the show can be found here at the following link - the final words are "In the spectacular final celebrations, all the daughters and their beaux are married in a Christian wedding ceremony " http://broadwaybuffet.wetpaint.com/page/13+Daughters+-+Full+Synopsis 'Thirteen Daughters' was actually first produced in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1956 - it took 5 years to make it to Broadway. I know some of the above was captured in a previous TC thread ... http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=20751&forum=5 but I felt it deserved a new thread on its own. Vern [ Edited by: ikitnrev 2008-07-31 23:21 ]

One of the local tiki folks here in DC, artist Jared Davis, works as a theater set designer. He recently found the following amazing image in one of his textbooks -- "Scenery for the Theater" by Harold Burris-Meyer and Edward C. Cole (1971) --

This giant tiki was from a Broadway show called 'Thirteen Daughters' - the first Broadway musical set in Hawaii - and a flop that played for only 3 weeks (25 performances) from March 5 -23, 1961. The show was ready to close after only one week, but a woman who was friends with the producer invested an additional $75,000 in the show ... and promptly departed for Europe! The show closed two weeks later, and one month later the Tiki Ti opened! (no relation between the two events)

The Broadway show starred Don Ameche and Ed Kenney.

The review from Time Magazine (dated March 10, 1961) is amusing --- the play gets lame reviews, until the last line, where the set design is praised for its elegance.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,826951,00.html

The NY Times review didn't exactly praise the show either. The last sentence of that review said 'But Hawaii will have to console itself with the thought that it took Oklahoma a few decades after achieving statehood to get a musical and song worthy of its pride."

The set designer, George Jenkins, was nominated for a Tony for this work, along with the show's musical director, but they both lost out to the people who did Camelot that year. Bye Bye Birdie was also a big Tony winning musical that year. One year earlier, Jenkins also did the set design for the play 'The Miracle Worker' (starring Anne Bancroft) which was also nominated for a Tony award.

The playwright, Eaton Magoo Jr., was born and raised in Hawaii. He did a couple of other Broadway shows in the 1970's, one called 'Aloha' and the other 'Heathen'

Amazingly, a video clip of 'Thirteen Daughters' still exists - the cast performed a song/dance routine on the Ed Sullivan show on March 5, 1961 Unfortunately, the giant tiki didn't make the trip to the TV studio, but you do get sailors chasing Hula Girls.
http://www.bluegobo.com/production.php?var=10189

The whole synopsis of the show can be found here at the following link - the final words are "In the spectacular final celebrations, all the daughters and their beaux are married in a Christian wedding ceremony "
http://broadwaybuffet.wetpaint.com/page/13+Daughters+-+Full+Synopsis

'Thirteen Daughters' was actually first produced in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1956 - it took 5 years to make it to Broadway.

I know some of the above was captured in a previous TC thread ...
http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=20751&forum=5
but I felt it deserved a new thread on its own.

Vern

[ Edited by: ikitnrev 2008-07-31 23:21 ]