Hawaiian Eye

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Hawaiian Eye
Hawaiian Eye.JPG
Created by Roy Huggins
Starring Anthony Eisley
Robert Conrad
Connie Stevens
Poncie Ponce
Grant Williams
Troy Donahue
Theme music composer Jerry Livingston
Mack David
Opening theme"The Hawaiian Eye Theme" performed by Warren Barker
Country of originUnited States
No. of seasons4
No. of episodes134 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producer William T. Orr
ProducersStanley Niss
Charles Hoffman
Ed Jurist
Oren W. Haglund (Production manager)
Production locations Oahu, Hawaii
California
Running time60 minutes
Production company Warner Bros. Television
Original release
Network ABC
ReleaseOctober 7, 1959 (1959-10-07) 
April 2, 1963 (1963-04-02)
Related
77 Sunset Strip
Bourbon Street Beat
Surfside 6

Hawaiian Eye is an American detective television series that ran from October 1959 to April 1963 on the ABC television network.

Contents

Premise

Private investigator Tracy Steele (Anthony Eisley) and his half-Hawaiian partner, Tom Lopaka (Robert Conrad), own Hawaiian Eye, a combination detective agency and private security firm, located in Honolulu, Hawaii. Their principal client is the Hawaiian Village Hotel, which in exchange for security services, provides the agency with a luxurious private compound on the hotel grounds. The partners investigate mysteries and protect clients with the sometime help of photographer Cricket Blake (Connie Stevens), who also sings at the hotel's Shell Bar, and a ukulele-playing cab driver Kim Quisado (Poncie Ponce), who has connections throughout the islands. Engineer turned detective Greg McKenzie (Grant Williams), joins the agency later on as a full partner, while hotel social director Philip Barton (Troy Donahue) lends a hand after Tracy Steele departs. [1]

Background and run

Hawaiian Eye was one of several ABC/Warner Bros. Television detective series of the era situated in different exotic locales. Others included Hollywood-based 77 Sunset Strip ; Bourbon Street Beat , set in New Orleans; and Miami's Surfside 6 . In reality, all were shot on the Warner Bros. backlot in Burbank, Calif. making it easy for characters—and sometimes whole scripts—to cross over. Although the shows are not spin-offs in the traditional sense, Sunset was the first in this chain of "exotic location detective series". In this regard, Hawaiian Eye was the most viable of the Sunset look-alikes, lasting four seasons. [2] The show's debut coincided with several real-world developments that helped contribute to its longevity. These were the granting of statehood to Hawaii, the advent of mass tourism to the new state brought about by the introduction of jetliners for commercial passenger flights, and the promotional efforts of Henry J. Kaiser, whose real-estate projects in Honolulu included building the hotel complex originally known as Kaiser's Hawaiian Village (later the Hilton Hawaiian Village Hotel).

Cast

The series regulars, who were shown during the opening credits, are listed below in the order in which they debuted during the show's four-year run.

CharacterActorRoleSeasons
Thomas Jefferson "Tom" Lopaka Robert Conrad Private investigator1959–1963
Tracy Steele Anthony Eisley Private investigator1959–1962
Chryseis "Cricket" Blake Connie Stevens Photographer and singer1959–1963
Kazuo "Kim" Quisado Poncie Ponce Cab driver1959–1963
Greg McKenzie Grant Williams Private investigator1960–1963
Philip Barton Troy Donahue Hotel social director1962–1963

Recurring characters

Robert Conrad and Connie Stevens, 1960 Robert Conrad Connie Stevens Hawaiian Eye 1960.JPG
Robert Conrad and Connie Stevens, 1960
Robert Conrad and Connie Stevens, 1961 Robert Conrad Connie Stevens Hawaiian Eye 1961.JPG
Robert Conrad and Connie Stevens, 1961

Guest musical acts

All of the Warner Bros. detective shows of this era featured a musical interlude, generally performed by a series regular. On occasion, Hawaiian Eye had a guest act perform:

Legacy

Hawaiian Eye would become the precursor in a long list of other crime action-drama detective and police procedural television shows based in and around Hawaii, including Hawaii Five-O and its reboot series, Magnum, P.I. and its reboot series, Hawaiian Heat , One West Waikiki , Hawaii and NCIS: Hawai'i .

In other media

Episode list

See List of Hawaiian Eye episodes

References

  1. Terrace, Vincent (May 16, 2016). Television Series of the 1950s: Essential Facts and Quirky Details. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 71–72. ISBN   978-1-4422-6104-4.
  2. 1 2 Kevin Burton Smith. "Hawaiian Eye". Thrilling Detective. Retrieved August 10, 2007.
  3. "b98.tv video of "Hawaiian Escapade" episode".