Once a week, currently on Tuesdays at 11 am (call ahead to confirm), tours of this stunning and unique historic theater are offered to the public for a nominal $10 fee. The tour is excellent and highly recommended. Words like "Beaux Arts", "vaudeville", and "proscenium" will arise in conversation. You will get to hear the story of how the theater was conceived and funded, what opening night was like, and how it was restored to its former glory after years of neglect. You will get to see the highly-detailed, historically accurate interior finishes; the elusive, decorated fire curtain; and a rare theater pipe organ (which is different from church pipe organs; hearing Bill play vintage music on the organ was magnificent!). You will learn that the glowing ceiling dome was originally designed to function as a chimney; that the building originally utilized the stack effect and underfloor air supply to provide natural ventilation; that the balcony is cantilevered unlike any other theater in the state. When the theater opened in 1922, silent films accompanied by pipe organ music were punctuated by live performances. The Hawaii Theater is the only remaining venue in the state capable of accommodating both live performances and movie screenings.
Emory & Webb designed the building. They also designed the Blaisdell Hotel building nearby (absolutely do not miss it if you visit Hawaii Theater!), the Honolulu Advertiser building, and Honpa Hongwanji on the Pali, among many others. Emory came to Hawaii in the 1890s to farm coffee. He is the father of renowned Bishop Museum ethnologist Kenneth Emory.
The ship Marshall Webb worked on as a marine engineer accidentally left him in Hawaii in 1900. Unlike Dillingham, Sr., it eventually picked him up, but Webb later returned to Hawaii and stayed. Webb became the design architect in the Emory & Webb partnership and a WWI veteran, among many other things.