I And My Land

One can’t properly define the “I” without understanding the “Land.”

That is the premise of Keo Woolford’s autobiographical performance piece “I-LAND,” which combines dance, chants, story-telling, theater, music and a body that has segments of Manila’s population ooh-ing and aah-ing and all but swooning to a faint. He is in town for performances of “I-LAND” at the Cultural Center’s Tanghalang Aurelio Tolentino on Jan. 22 to 25.

Woolford’s solo performance – he is onstage for 90 minutes straight, with no commercial interruptions, thank you – is a heady mix of Hawaiian hula and hip-hop, Hawaiian “talk story” and narrative, and traditional hula music or mele.

Media got a sample the other day at a press conference, and “I-LAND” defies categorizing, except to call it a performance. I must thus fall back on the hand-out description of his work:

“Woolford chronicles his first exposure to the hula and how he came under the instruction of his idol, whom he dubs the ‘Hula god.’ He also describes his fleeting brush with fame as a member of a boy band that almost hits the big time, his subsequent descent into a world of drugs and parting, and his rediscovery of the dance that connects him to both his culture and to himself.”

Woolford’s road to self-discovery has been a complicated and highly eventful one. He does not talk about his personal circumstances – even his age is not to be asked or discussed – except to say that he was born and raised in Hawaii. He began dancing hula in high school, and soon joinedthe hula school or halau of Robert Cazimero, who is now his choreographer.

He started his theater career with, auspiciously, a one-man show, the critically-acclaimed “He Hawaii Au,” which he wrote. He starred in several successful stage productions in Los Angeles, returned to Hawaii in 1998 and became a member of Brownskin, a boy band ala ’Nsync. Their self-titled release was the best-selling pop album in 1999.

As a songwriter, Woolford had written several hits for Brownskin, as well as other artists in Hawaii and even Japan. His music has also been featured in a couple of movies. As songwriter and vocalist, he was part of the CD Island Warriors, which was nominated for a Grammy Award as Best Reggae Album.

In 2002 he starred as the King in Rogers and Hammerstein’s The King and I in London’s West End, the longest-running revival of a R&H production in history. He then headed to New York, where he continued his acting career on stage, film and television, and where began the seeds of I-LAND.

Woolford reveals that I-LAND was “almost two years in the making.” Collaborating with him were director Roberta Uno and choreographers Robert Cazimero (for hula) and Rokafella (for hip-hop). I-LAND was co-commissioned by the Asia Society and the Ma-Yi Theater Company, which had previously brought such pieces as The Romance of Magno Rubio and Flipzoids to Manila.

Woolford shares that hula was initially a sacred dance, performed only by men. When Protestant missionaries came to the islands in 1820, they considered it a heathen dance, and the newly Christianized Hawaiian royalty agreed to ban the hula – although they still practised it in secret.

During the reign of King David Kalakaua from 1874 to 1891, there was a resurgence of interest in traditional arts, including the hula. Mainlanders who found their way to Hawaii saw in the graceful and sensual dance a means to attract visitors. With beautiful island girls now allowed to perform the dance, the modern-day hula was born.

“From the beginning, we didn’t want I-LAND to be a tourist guide to hula or to claim there is one Hawaiian identity,” says director Roberta Uno. “We wanted to reach beneath the surface, without completely revealing the kaona, the multiple, hidden or deeper meanings underneath.”

I-LAND will open on Jan. 22 at 8 pm at a gala fundraiser to benefit the Asian Cultural Council-Philippines’ fellowship grants program, as well as the CCP’s Makiling Academic and Research Institute for the Arts scholarship to provide talented young Filipinos with assistance for their college education. Other performances of I-LAND are on Jan. 23 and 24 at 8 pm, and Jan. 25 at 3 pm, all at the CCP. For tickets, call the CCP Box Office at tel 832-3704 or TicketWorld at 891-9999.