The acrobats, artists and musicians of the new Cirque du Soleil show ‘Auana will debut Thursday night to the first paying audience in Waikīkī.
The show is an opportunity to showcase not just Hawaiʻi culture but Hawaiʻi talent as well. Cirque du Soleil co-founder Guy Laliberté was inspired by the beauty of Hawaiʻi.
Hawaiian fashion designer Manaola Yap created costumes for the show. He said he saw a ring around the moon, a “moonbow,” one night at his home on Hawaiʻi Island and took it as a sign to be part of this artistic endeavor.
"It's definitely a dream come true to just see it and even more so a dream that I never had imagined — that our Indigenous Hawaiian art would be elevated on a platform like this with Cirque du Soleil to celebrate our stories of Hawaiʻi in that way. So it's definitely been an enriching experience," he said.
Manaola shared he drew inspiration for the costumes from his home.
"I know that every time I go back home, it's almost like returning to a spring — that rush of energy of just being able to drink from it and to be nourished and to just feel that vitality. Every time I go home is important and it transcends beyond us in our artwork, and you see it pushed through in many pieces and parts of our arts," he said.
Yap said the show was designed to tell the stories of Hawaiʻi in a native voice instead of the usual commercialized way.
"I think opportunities like the Cirque du Soleil show where there's storytelling involved through the hula, through the mele, there's definitely a beautiful aloha, a beautiful reciprocal exchange that happens in a spiritual way, in a deeper way, in a meaningful way through the storytelling that really allows us to restore our native voice and help to really rewrite the narrative of this place in a good way and in an exciting and inspiring way," he said.
Salvador Salangsang plays a comic character, a trickster in the show. He was born in Hawaiʻi and has fond memories at Ala Wai Elementary, hanging around McCully and Waikīkī.
His resume includes stints with Cirque, at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas with David Cassidy, on Broadway with Tommy Tune, and as an understudy for Rick Springfield. His most recent gig was in Dubai.
Salangsang said that when co-creator and director Neil Dorward asked him to come back home and perform, he jumped at the chance.
"I got emotional like I do now every time, because to come back home and do a show in Hawaiʻi, where Iʻm from, about Hawaiʻi, with people from Hawaiʻi, and being a family and a ʻohana again, it's really brought me back to the culture and to learn again," Salangsang said.
He said that getting back into "island life" has been a blessing.
"I'm a big fan of the show just as much as I think everybody else would be, because we get to watch it every day and it never gets boring," Salangsang said.
ʻAuana has set up shop at the Outrigger Waikīkī Beachcomber Hotel on Oʻahu. Tickets are available online, and kamaʻāina can save up to 30% off. For more information, click here.
Editor's note: Outrigger Hospitality Group is an underwriter of HPR.
This interview aired on The Conversation on Dec. 5, 2024. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. on HPR-1.
