AOLR Weekly Wrap-Up #55

Hawaii Five-0 Articles & Buzz:

• We’ll start with a great item from James Marsters’ monthly Q&A:
  

  Did you and Alex O’Loughlin share vampire stories on the Hawaii Five-0 set?
  No. What we shared was stunts. Alex is a certified stunt man in Australia. I’m certified for stage. So, what we shared was, “I can’t wait to get to set so these stunt men learn who we are!” (Big laugh) He and I committed robbery that day. We made the stunt guys sit down and relax, which is almost impossible. Alex is the man. He is a mountain of muscle and I’m working out like crazy because the next time I fight that guy, he’s gonna kick my ass again. Last time I fought him, I couldn’t move my arms for two days.

  If you want to revisit James’ account of  the big fight scene in the pilot with Alex, you’ll find the video here.

• IGN UK features Hawaii Five-0 among their Fall TV’s Best Bets:
  

  So why are we spotlighting Hawaii Five-0? Well, for one the pilot is just a lot of fun. There’s something to be said for a well done escapist bit of entertainment – the USA network is practically built on this belief. And while Hawaii Five-0 may not be the place for serialized, intense drama, if the episodes to come follow the pilot, it will be a place for well done action with a sense of flair and excitement, which few series (Human Target being a notable exception) seem to capture these days.

  On the casting side, lead Alex O’Loughlin and Scott Caan have likable buddy cop chemistry as the new McGarrett and Dano, while Lost‘s Daniel Dae Kim and Battlestar Galactica‘s Grace Park add to the notable nerd bait factor.

• HitFix’s Alan Sepinwall lists Hawaii Five-0 as one of the best new shows he saw at the TCAs:
  

  I liked the remake of the iconic ’70s cop drama more than I expected to, since it’s a vehicle for Alex O’Loughlin and my enthusiasm for him has never come close to matching that of CBS’ development team. O’Loughlin’s still pretty stiff, but Scott Caan is a lot of fun as his sidekick – so obviously strong that the producers are now suggesting it’s going to be more of a buddy show (more politely, “an ensemble”) than a star piece – Daniel Dae Kim and Grace Park are good, too, and director Len Wiseman gives it the feel of a noisy but entertaining summer action movie. We’ll see if the show can keep up that style on a weekly basis, but it’s a good start.

• BuzzSugar is quite positive too, but it doesn’t sound like they’ve checked out the numerous Comic-Con and TCA reports thoroughly:
  

  Where it works: The show may be a reboot, but you’d never be able to tell (other than the iconic theme song, of course); the show is fresh, fast-paced, and has an interesting hodge-podge of likable characters. O’Loughlin is a bit stiff but boy is he easy on the eyes, and his buddy chemistry with Scott Caan couldn’t be better. Of course the gorgeous scenery doesn’t hurt either.

  Where it doesn’t: The guys succeed in capturing their first bad guy by the end of the episode, and I assume there won’t be a ton of continuity from one episode to the next. With so many other cop dramas out there, it might be hard to get viewers addicted to a show that doesn’t require weekly viewings.

  Addressing the “stiff” comments, I wonder if people forget that Steve McGarrett is investigating his father’s recent murder in the pilot. Alex works subtly and doesn’t lay it on thick in his roles. We can’t expect everyone to appreciate him, but quite noticeably, it’s usually the men among the critics who don’t…

• Tim Ryan has only heard positive feedback from the crew of Hawaii Five-0:
  

  Crew seem to be happy – no ecstatic – about “The Five-0? experience so far…”I’m very happy, very happy,” one crew member told Reel Hawaii this week… One surprising thing several local crew said is having a few production executives “actually taking time to tell us when we do a good job,” a crew member said…”That is very rare”…

  “There’s a decidedly lack of yelling on this one,” a crew vet said… That’s saying a lot considering all the location changes and new sets required….A former Honolulu Advertiser warehouse is being used as a sound stage; the production offices are at at Gentry-Pacific on Nimitz Highway…

  He also quotes a CBS executive who says that by mid October the decision will be made whether or not to continue with the full season. That means that we will have confirmation one way or the other after the first four episodes. Going by all the interest and the positive response the reboot has generated so far, I honestly don’t think that we need to lose any sleep over the future of the show!

  Make sure you scroll down Tim’s blog so that you don’t miss the picture of Alex with two fans! Tim has also posted more behind the scenes images in an earlier blog post.

• It’s not just the crew who are content, but also the guest actors. Here’s a wonderful comment from Duane Char on the Hawaii Actors Network:
  

  I also must commend the show and the star actors. I saw Alex O’Loughlin go out of his way to call over a young actor who had a speaking part that day, to sit with he and Scott as the talked…just to make this kid feel a part. I saw Grace Park eating lunch with this same actor, talking to him one-on-one. I saw Scott Caan pick up and carry his own chair from scene to scene.

  I was impressed. I’ll be honest, I don’t recall seeing that same kind of quality when I did gigs on Lost.

• Daily Actor got to interview Daniel Dae Kim as part of a round table at Comic-Con. Although nothing essentially new was discussed, it’s still a good read and there’s also a podcast of the interview if you want to listen to Daniel’s great voice!

Hawaii Five-0 Updates:

• H50 writers’ assistant, Mike Schaub, is now blogging on CBS’s Hawaii Five-0 site! Mike will be taking us behind the scenes in the writers room at Paramount Studios on a weekly basis and promises that:
  

  “… from top to bottom, every single person on staff is committed to bringing you the best possible television show we can. It’s really a labor of love for us, and we can only hope it shows.”

  As the writers’ assistant is most likely the second-most important person in the writers room, coming in close behind the showrunner  , it’s great that he’s taking the time to do this – thank you, Mike! You can also follow Mike on Twitter – he’ll love your feedback!

• As we approach the premiere date of September 20th, advertising for H50 is being ramped up! Here are three cool pictures you might want to check out: bus ad – billboard 1 – billboard 2.
• There have been loads of articles about Heroes‘ hero Masi Oka joining the Hawaii Five-0 cast in the recurring role (as confirmed by J.R. Orci) of coroner George Bergman and TV Guide was the first to report it. Masi will debut in episode 104 (“Nalowale”) which starts shooting tomorrow!
• More casting news: TV Guide also reports that comedian/actor D.L. Hughley will play the role of Skeet in episode 103 and from numerous tweets it appears that One Tree Hill’s Michael Copon plays a high school football player in 102. Hawaii comedian Augie T. is also slated to appear in one or more episodes, starting with 103 or 104, going by the date of the report in Aloha Update.

Hawaii Five-0 Theme Song Updates:

• We’ve read before about the Hawaii Five-0 theme song being the center of a big marketing campaign this summer. New is that there will also be magazine ads with theme song sound chips, as reported by InsideBlip:
  

  Other facets of the campaign include oldies radio stations featuring contests where DJs will play snippets of the theme and give away trips to the Big Island, magazine ads equipped with sound chips that play the theme and a competition where college bands can enter their versions sponsored by the CBS College Sports Network. The song remains popular with marching bands, especially at the University of Hawaii, where it is the unofficial fight song.

• Speaking of the University of Hawaii – its marching band will likely be featured in a CBS promo! The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports that CBS will be filming the band playing the theme song on September 2nd during halftime at a game:
  

  CBS has confirmed it plans to send its “Hawaii Five-0″ cameras to shoot the University of Hawaii band at halftime of the Warriors’ Sept. 2 game against Southern Cal. Of course, the band will play the police drama’s classic theme. George Schweitzer, president of CBS marketing, said the network wants to create promotional spots for TV and online use. “The theme is the most enduring theme in all of television,” he said last week. “And nowhere will it be more authentic than at halftime on the field of Aloha Stadium.”

  I haven’t been able to find any official videos, but did find two amateur ones on YouTube of the band playing the signature tune and they are very talented: video 1 and video 2.

• And check out this locally produced TV promo for the San Diego area featuring the theme song on YouTube!

Other Updates:

• The Boston Herald published an article about TV vampires and featured Mick St. John at #9 in their list of 10:
  

  Mick St. John, “Moonlight”: Mick (Alex O’Loughlin) refused to hunt women, children or innocent people, which makes him one of the least threatening creatures on this list – unless you were a criminal. In that case, it was best to run.

  There’s also a scan of the print edition in the gallery!

• Last week an “official” Alex O’Loughlin Facebook account showed up in a Google alert. Please be aware that the account is not Alex’s; the reason that it has garnered so many friends is because it was set up quite a while ago. CBS has confirmed that Alex is not on Facebook and Alex himself mentioned in April that he is “not very good at blogging or Twittering or anything like that”, so it’s unlikely that he will ever join Facebook. The only genuine Alex O’Loughlin social networking account can be found on MySpace and he continues to maintain that himself.
• TV Guide published an interesting article about television’s current top earners and it’s gratifying to see that our Alex now qualifies as one. Although studio execs are putting their foot down when it comes to over-inflated paychecks, the good news is, “If it’s a hit show, you start paying”. Go Five-0! 
• If you’d like a 5×7″ copy of the Elephant Project’s picture of Alex taken at Paramount Studios on December 15th, the day he wrapped the last episode of Three Rivers, then you can order it from the Elephant Project’s store. You can check out the auction of the picture, card signed by Alex and baby elephant beanie on eBay – it ends tonight at 6:54 pm PDT and bidding is currently approaching $1,000 – which is almost double the Project’s highest auction so far!

Gallery Updates:

• Added to the gallery are the latest Hawaii Five-0 promotional posters and cast pictures.
• I also spent an enjoyable hour making huge screen caps of the HD TV Guide cover shoot video!