Hawaii Five-O (1968 TV series)

*Hawaii Five-O*
Hawaii Five-O
	File:Hawaiifiveoscreenshot.jpg The opening title sequence
Created by	Leonard Freeman
Starring	Jack Lord; James MacArthur; Zulu; Kam Fong; Al Harrington; Herman Wedemeyer; Richard Denning; William Smith
Opening theme	Morton Stevens
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	284 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producers	Leonard Freeman; Philip Leacock; Leonard Katzman
Running time	approx. 0:60 (per episode)
Original release
Network	CBS
Release	September 26 1968 –; April 26 1980

Hawaii Five-O is an American television series that starred Jack Lord and James MacArthur as detectives for a fictional Hawaii state police department.

Overview

The CBS television network produced and transmitted the program from September 26 (September 20 for the pilot episode, "Cocoon"), 1968 to April 5 1980. Currently, the program is aired in syndication throughout the world. Created by Leonard Freeman, Hawaii Five-O was shot on location in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, and throughout the island of Oʻahu — with occasional filming in other locales like Los Angeles, Singapore and Hong Kong as well as other Hawaiian islands.

Hawaii Five-O centers on a fictional state police force of the same name — in honor of Hawaiʻi's status as the 50th State — led by former Navy officer Steve McGarrett (Jack Lord), who was appointed by the Governor Paul Jameson (Richard Denning). Originally, McGarrett was assisted regularly by State Police officers — a young officer, Danny Williams (James MacArthur), Chin Ho Kelly (Kam Fong) and Kono Kalakaua (Zulu). Later, Honolulu Police Department Officer Duke Lukela (Herman Wedemeyer) joined the team as a regular as did Ben Kokua (Al Harrington). Occasionally, they were assisted by other officers on an "as-needed" basis. During the course of the show, the team was also assisted regularly by: the medical examiner Doc Bergman (Al Eben), the forensic specialist Che Fong (Harry Endo) and a secretary. The first secretary was May (Maggi Parker), then Jenny (Peggy Ryan) and later Luana (Laura Sode-Matteson). (At the time Hawaii was the only state without an actual statewide police agency. The Hawaii State Sheriff's Department now serves as the de facto state police.)

For twelve seasons McGarrett and his team hounded criminals and Mafia syndicates plaguing the Hawaiian Islands. With the aide of District Attorney and later Hawaiʻi Attorney General John Manicote (Glenn Cannon), McGarrett was successful in sending most of his enemies to prison. One such Mafia syndicate was led by crime family patriarch Honore Vashon (Harold Gould), a character introduced in the fifth season. Blaming McGarrett for the death of his son, Vashon swore vengeance using all of the resources available to him. Most episodes of Hawaii Five-O ended with the arrest of criminals with McGarrett's catch phrase to Williams, "Book 'em, Danno!" with the offense occasionally added after.

The approximately six-strong Five-O team, unfeasibly small for a real state police unit, was portrayed as occupying a suite of offices in the Iolani Palace. Curiously it lacked its own radio network, necessitating frequent requests by McGarrett to the Honolulu Police Department dispatchers to "Patch me through to Danno". McGarrett's immovable hairstyle and proclivity for wearing a dark suit and tie on all possible occasions created a motif that rapidly passed into popular culture.

In many episodes (including the pilot) McGarrett was drawn into the world of international espionage and national intelligence. McGarrett's archnemesis on Hawaii Five-O was an intelligence officer of the People's Republic of China, Wo Fat. The Communist rogue agent was played by veteran actor Khigh Dheigh.

The show's action and straight-forward story-telling left little time for personal stories such as wives and girlfriends, though a two-part story in the first season dealt with the loss of his sister's baby. Occasionally a show would flash back to McGarrett's younger years or to a romantic figure. The viewer is left with the impression that McGarrett, like Dragnet's Joe Friday, is wedded to the police force and to crime-fighting at this point in his life.

Hawaii Five-O survived long enough to see reruns of early episodes enter syndication while new episodes were still being produced. The 12th season was repackaged into syndication under the title McGarrett.

Legacy

The show became the longest running police drama until Law & Order broke the record approximately 22 years after Hawaii Five-O ceased production. The popularity of the Hawaii Five-O format spawned various police dramas on all the major television networks since its debut. Another legacy is the popularity of the arranged Hawaii Five-O theme song composed by Morton Stevens and later covered by surf music band The Ventures, a song that is particularly popular for college and high school marching bands to play, especially at the University of Hawai'i, in which it has become the University's unofficial fight song. It also made a brief appearance in the animated film Shrek 2, when a trumpeter enthusiastically follows a fanfare with the first few bars of the theme song.

The term "Five-O" was adopted by American youth culture as a street slang term for the police.

The television show Magnum P.I. was created after Hawaii Five-0 ended its run in order to make further use of the production equipment left there. The first few episodes made direct references to Five-O, suggesting that it takes place in the same "universe" as the earlier show.

Criticism of the show pointed out that the vast majority of characters were haole (Caucasian), while only 40% of the population of the state identify themselves as non-Hispanic Caucasian; even these are not all haole, as over 80% claim some amount of Polynesian or Asian ancestry.

Opening and closing credits

The opening credits were no small part of the show's popularity. The show would begin with a "teaser" or prelude suggesting the sinister plot for the night's program. Cut to the big ocean wave ("Hawaii Five-O") and the start of the show's dynamic theme song. Fast-zoom-in to the top balcony of the Ilikai Hotel, where McGarrett would turn to face the camera ("Starring Jack Lord") followed by many quick-cuts and freeze-frames of Hawaiian scenery (including, memorably, a grass-skirted hula dancer from the pilot "Cocoon") and of the supporting players, thus setting the mood for the show, and then ending with a flashing blue light on a police motorcycle racing through a Honolulu street.

At the conclusion of the action-packed, suspense-filled episode, after the obligatory "Book 'em Danno!", Jack Lord would narrate a teaser for the next week's episode, often emphasizing the "guest villain", especially if it was a perennial such as Khigh Dheigh, Hume Cronyn, etc, then closing the preview by saying "be here...aloha!" Unfortunately, these next episode teasers would be removed from the syndicated episodes, since most stations do not show the episodes in order of original network broadcast.

There are two versions of the closing credits portion. During the first season, the theme music was played, along with a short film of a flashing blue light attached to the rear of a police motorcycle racing through Kalakaua Avenue in Waikiki heading west (this scene can no longer be replicated, as Kalakaua Ave. is now a one-way street, with traffic moving east towards Diamond Head.) This image was eventually satirized in Leslie Nielsen's TV series and movies centering on a law enforcement team called Police Squad!. In later seasons, the same music played over a short film of some outrigger canoeists battling the surf.

Trivia

It has been rumored for many years that Jack Lord was a silent partner in all aspects of the production of Hawaii Five-O, even more so as the series grew in popularity during the 1970s. To critics and viewers, there was no question that Jack Lord was the center of the show, and that the other actors frequently served as little more than props, standing and watching while McGarrett emoted and paced around his office, analyzing the crime. But many episodes would focus on the other players, and let them showcase their own talents.
Very few episodes of Five-O were shot anywhere but Hawaiʻi. At least two were shot in Los Angeles and another in Hong Kong. Episodes shot on location were the only ones not to bear the "Filmed in Hawaii" legend.
Jack Lord was the only actor to appear in all episodes of Five-O and was the only original cast member remaining when its last episode aired in 1980.
Today, James MacArthur is the only surviving first-season member of Five-O, as Lord, Zulu, and Fong have since died. MacArthur was actually the second Danny Williams -- in the pilot, the role was filled by another actor.
MacArthur has said on talk show appearances that he calculates that the Five-O team would have accounted for all major crime and criminals on the islands several times over.
Silent film actress Dorothy Mackaill was occasionally coaxed out of retirement to make appearances on the series.
The show continues to be seen in Hawaiʻi since it left the air, thus making it the longest-running show to continue airing in the state after it ceased production. It is currently seen on Honolulu independent outlet KWHE.
The external shots of the building which housed the Five-O squad were of the ʻIolani Palace, which was the original home of the Hawaiian monarchy. The office interiors were a soundstage set.
At least 3 episodes were centered around Danno. One episode took us to his apartment, and a second one probed into his love life a bit. He was engaged to a woman whose death was the plot line of the episode. A third episode in 1976 has Danny dating an actress, Anne Waring (Meg Foster), who becomes a target of criminals.
In a 1st season episode, a two-parter "Once Upon A Time", we learn that McGarrett has a sister and a brother-in-law. The story line has McGarrett going to California to visit his sister and brother-in-law after learning that their infant son has cancer. A doctor is treating the baby with unethical methods to cure him, but the baby dies anyway. McGarrett seeks out the truth about the doctor and her unethical methods on patients.
Chin Ho Kelly had 8 kids, as we learned in an early Five-O episode. This seems to have been a family trait, as his many relatives were apparently involved in all facets of life in Hawaii, from laborers in the sugar cane fields to Honolulu policemen, bartenders, tour bus drivers, etc. -- and Kelly knew them all by name. This is actually authentic, as descendants of the early Chinese canefield laborers diversified throughout Hawaiian society, while maintaining family ties.
Kam Fong (Chin Ho Kelly) was the only cast member who really was once a Police Officer for the City of Honolulu.
McGarrett's trademark vehicle, often seen squealing tires throughout Honolulu, was a triple-black 1968 Mercury Park Lane Brougham 4-door hardtop. Around the 1973/74 season, his Park Lane was replaced by a 1973 Mercury Marquis Brougham, used until the end of the series. In 2003-2004, Mercury produced a limited-edition version of its long-running(and still-popular) Grand Marquis sedan called the Marauder; originally destined for a production total of at least 50,000 vehicles, just under 12,000 were produced, and the first Marauder was sold in Honolulu. Some of the automotive magazines field-tested the Marauder in and around Honolulu, with photo shoots around Iolani Palace.
Six years before creating and producing Hawaii Five-O, Leonard Freeman spent one season producing a show about another "elite, special investigative squad"", The Untouchables.
The phone numbers that were dialed from various Honolulu-area phone booths throughout the run of the series were actual household numbers, which caused some "invasion of privacy" concerns for residents, even after the series ended; hence in the middle of the series run, the Honolulu phone prefix "(808)555-xxxx" was to be used on every episode from then on.The "555-xxxx" phone prefix is still used on various TV crime dramas, like on "CSI:Crime Scene Investigation", where occasionally, a "(702)555-xxxx" number is used.
CBS' Honolulu TV-station, KGMB-TV(Channel 9) had a close association w/ Leonard Freeman Productions and the CBS network during the series run, since many episodes almost always featured a mobile TV broadcast van from that station, usually in the background.; a similar idea is currently used on "CSI:Miami", where there would be a TV reporter from the Miami CBS station(WFOR-TV Channel 4) usually trying to interview Miami-Dade Police Lt. Horatio Caine(played by David Caruso). Surprisingly, the CBS network uses fictional stations for the other two "CSI:" shows(Las Vegas uses a "W-series" callsign instead of KLAS-TV Channel 8, and New York has NO mention of WCBS-TV Channel 2 at all).
United Airlines was believed to be the "official" airline for the series, since(in almost every episode) many Honolulu airport scenes always showed some of United's Boeing 747s either taking off or landing;the closing credits always acknowledged this in many epsodes.Also, in a few episodes that take place overseas regarding McGarrett's relentless pursuit of Wo Fat, Singapore Airlines 747s are seen leaving Honolulu's airport;the airline is also acknowledged at the end of these episodes.
'Five-O' is a common slang term to refer to the police.

Cast

Steve McGarrett played by Jack Lord (original cast)
Danny "Danno" Williams played by James MacArthur (original cast) (Tim O'Kelly in the pilot)
Kono Kalakaua played by Zulu (original cast) (1968-1972)
Chin Ho Kelly played by Kam Fong (original cast) (1968-1978)
Attorney General John Manicote played by Glenn Cannon
Ben Kokua played by Al Harrington
Che Fong (the forensic specialist) played by Harry Endo
Doc Bergman (the medical examiner) played by Al Eben
Duke Lukela (police sgt. with HPD who was promoted to the unit) played by Herman Wedemeyer
Governor Paul Jameson played by Richard Denning (original cast) (Lew Ayres in the pilot)
May (secretary) played by Maggi Parker (original cast) (Mitzi Hoag in the pilot)
Jenny Sherman (secretary) played by Peggy Ryan

Supporting actors

Wo Fat played by Khigh Dheigh in the pilot, and occasionally throughout the series, including the final episode
Lieutenant Kealoha played by Douglas Mossman (season 1)
Jonathan Kaye (from the State Dept.) played by James Gregory (pilot),
Doc (just plain) played by Newell Tarrant (season1),
Lori Wilson played by Sharon Farrell (season 12)
Che Fong played by Danny Kamekona (season 1)
Truck Kealoha played by Moe Keale (season 12)
Frank Kemana played by Douglas Mossman (season 7)
James "Kimo" Carew played by William Smith (season 12)
Luana played by Laura Sode
Walter Stewart played by Morgan White (season 1)
Attorney General played by Philip Ahn (pilot)
Mildred played by Peggy Ryan (season 1)
Sandi Wells played by Amanda McBroom (Various Seasons)

References in popular culture

Surf/rock band The Ventures recorded a version of the Five-O theme in 1969. It was released as a single and went to #4 on the Billboard pop chart.
Steve McGarrett is prominently mentioned in the Human League song "Circus of Death".
Another measure of the show's continued high popularity is that it was lampooned in Mad Magazine, in a typical not-very-subtle satire called "How-Are-Ya Five-O", which appeared in 1971. The characters were renamed Steve "McGarrish" and "Dummy" Williams.
The legacy of Five-O continued on into the series that replaced it, Magnum P.I., with many of the characters often referring to both Five-O and McGarrett. (Also, the show was filmed in Hawaiʻi and many of the sets were re-used in Magnum)
In a three-part episode of the situation comedy Sanford & Son set in Hawaiʻi, the fictional Five-O bureau is referenced several times. Although no Five-O cast members appear, the bureau members that are portrayed mention McGarrett and a running joke about his hair while the show's famous theme song plays in the background.
In the British police drama The Sweeney, the programme Hawaii Five-O is mentioned in the series one episode Stoppo Driver, which was originally broadcast in 1975. The reference to the programme is made in reference to a police officer suspected of working for a robbery gang only occurring "in Hawaii Five-O". The comment is made by George Carter (played by Dennis Waterman), who moments later in the programme says McGarrett's trademark line "Book 'em Danno".
Australian punk band Radio Birdman wrote a song inspired by Hawaii Five-O entitled "Aloha Steve & Danno". It is the first song on their 1977 debut album Radios Appear and contains the chorus "Steve, I want to say thank you for all you've done for me. My night is dark and empty when you're not on TV". The bridge of the song also features a guitar solo rendition of the Five-O theme.
For many years after the show finished its run, GTE Hawaiian Tel included a warning to tourists in its phone books that in an emergency, they should dial 911 and not Hawaii Five-O. The AAA auto club provided a similar warning in its Hawaii Tourbook.
Australian band Horse MacGuyver referenced the show with their Hawaiian themed song of the same name.
World-famous DJ LTJ Bukem (real name Danny Williamson) created his stage name out of the "Hawaii Five-O" catch phrase "Book 'em, Danno".
The theme song was played in Leroy & Stitch (2006) in the scene where Leroy captures all the experiments.
In the Australian movie, The Dish (2000), set in 1969, a band of high-school age boys are told to perform the American national anthem for visiting American politicians, but as they do not know it, they play the Five-O theme instead.
The theme song played in Madagascar (2005) when Marty was surfing on two dolphins.
In the animated sitcom The Simpsons, Chief Wiggum is often heard saying to his deputies upon arrest of a suspect, "Book 'em, Lou", a reference to Steve's "Book 'em, Danno". Also, in the episode entitled "The Father, the Son and the Holy Guest Star", in which Homer and Bart become Roman Catholic, the Five-O theme is heard as Marge's mobile phone ringtone.
Steve McGarrett was the role model for Mr. Hand in Fast Times At Ridgemont High.
Steve McGarrett is one of the iconic 'Steves' in the film "The Tao of Steve".

Episodes

Main Article: List of Hawaii Five-O episodes

DVD releases

Paramount Home Entertainment has released the first season of Hawaii Five-O on DVD in Region 1 for the very first time on March 6 2007. The 7-disc set includes the original pilot movie, also known as "The Cocoon", as well as a 1996 retrospective program produced by local Hawaiian television that included MacArthur as a guest host. Season Two will be released on July 31 2007. [1]. It is expected that the remaining ten seasons will be released soon.^{[citation needed]}

DVD Name	Ep #	Release Date	Additional Information
The Complete First Season	24	March 6 2007	Original pilot Retrospective
The Complete Second Season	25	July 31 2007

Other media

A soundtrack album featuring Morton Stevens' theme and incidental music was issued by Capitol Records in 1970. One of the instrumental pieces on the album, "Call to Danger", was excerpted as background music accompanying a "Special Presentation" logo that CBS used to introduce its prime time television specials throughout the 1970s and 1980s.

Hawaii Five-O was the subject of six novelizations. Each one had a plot line written for the book and was not based on a television episode. The first two books were published by Signet Paperbacks in 1968 and 1969. After that were two hard covers published by Whitman publishing in 1969 and 1971 and finally two more books were published in England.

An Oldsmobile commercial starring Gregory Hines and Patrick Warburton referenced Hawaii Five-O in a police pullover. Hines - "Who are you, Jack Lord?" Warburton - "No, but the man's like a father to me."

External links