Jack Cione, an extraordinary entrepreneur and a legendary showman with multiple careers, was 96 when he died peacefully in his sleep on Oct. 1 at the Arcadia residence for seniors.
In the last chapter of his life, Cione was best known as the producer, director and choreographer of the popular “Follies” staged by and at Arcadia, expressly for residents and their guests. His finale, entitled “Copacabana,” was a sellout Sept. 6 through 8.
Thus, the general public wouldn’t know much about this significant and scintillating wedge of his life. Cione was an Arcadian for 20 years, trading his previous condos to officially join the senior generation and play out his last years.
His colleagues, who starred in the inspiring “Follies” vehicle, were privy to a gentle giant who was a workaholic who turned non-performers into stage stars.
In the nearly 50 years I’ve chronicled his endeavors, I discovered Cione always did things his way. In death, he still was calling the shots.
Thus, there will be no memorial service, one of his last requests. His body has been donated to the John A. Burns School of Medicine.
“A humble individual, he wanted to leave quietly,” said Yvonne H.C. Toma, a colleague who regularly performed in the “Follies” and was Cione’s assistant director for 13 years whose role included transferring Cione’s hand-written script, composed aboard a sea cruise he adored, to the computer.
“We felt blessed he walked through our lives and know he is at peace and orchestrating fantastic productions with awesome costumes in heaven,” said Toma.
In an August phone conversation, Cione told me, “Everything’s wrong with me,” referring to chronic pain, heart and mobility issues. He had spent eight weeks in Kuakini Hospital and was relieved to be back home.
At that point, his last “Follies” was looming, and he confessed, “This is my last one.”
Arcadians will tell you that a Cione production would not be perfect without showgirls (and guys) decked out in bejeweled costumes, often put together with glue gun and old Arcadia sheets repurposed into gowns by Cione.
The sisterhood at Arcadia had tons of memories.
Anne Hedani said, “My first memory of involvement in Arcadia’s ‘Follies’ was one of pain..blisters and burns from a hot glue gun. Jack knew I wasn’t ready to walk across a stage, so he put me to work mending long feathered capes with a huge hot glue gun. It wasn’t much fun, but the following year I made my way to sitting on the stage waving my seaweed arms. By then Jack knew I was valuable in the costume department, so he kept me happy doing group dances.”
Toma said, “The longer I got to know Jack I got to know him as a brilliant person, always wanting the best for us and making us look good on stage. As a first timer performing, Jack treated me with respect and patience, supportive of my feelings and (he) understood where I was coming from. He never told me I was ‘awful’ and he only gave positive comments, ‘Do it again.”
Toma was blessed with a revelation, when Cione rehearsing the last “Follies,” that he was mentoring her to prep her to inherit the directorship of the show. “It was so touching to be told he was passing his torch to me and had the confidence that I could do it.”
Elva Yoshihara said his cast loved him. “It was his true kindness, his thoughtfulness and genuineness that made him so special. I consider him the most unforgettable character I ever met. He would see the slightest detail, which when corrected would make a difference in the whole scene. Nothing missed his sharp eyes. Even at this last Follies and he was truly tired and obviously ailing. I happened to walk by him on the way to the stage, and he called out to me, ‘Elva, where’s your bracelet?’
Yoshihara added, negative press about Cione’s earlier life of naked men and women didn’t acknowledge that these ventures from his past reflected “the business side of him. He knew what would sell and he knew when to pull out; he had impeccable timing when it came to business.”
She recalled an incidence when he had to pass through backstage , where women were all changing, he never once looked up as he passed through as others have. “He kept his eyes focused on his mission. He never touched us, ever, and he had good reason to if he wanted, as he oversaw all the costumes. People have no idea of that side of him. He is just pictured in another way.”
Cione and his wife Maydelle (now deceased) came from Phoenix AZ — where they operated a dozen Arthur Murray-style dance studios — to Hawaii for their honeymoon. The Ciones loved the islands and never left.
His early fame – what most folks remember – was operating a string of nightlife clubs like the Dunes on Nimitz Highway, Forbidden City at the entrance to Waikiki and Le Boom Boom club in the International Market Place.
At the Dunes, he featured legit acts like Judy Garland, Pearl Bailey, and Wayne Newton before they became show biz legends, and Cione gained international fame when he switched policies to launch a Naked Waiter luncheon show, marketed to lure workforce women to cheer and applaud when their waiters dropped trous and hit the stage during lunch hour in the 1970s.
Forbidden City was essentially a strip club, where the likes of Tempest Storm did her gyrations, though actor Sal Mineo starred in “Fortune and Men’s Eyes” in 1970.
Le Boom Boom was essentially a dance production with exotic women, clad in flashy costumes.
Cione also staged a “Follies” show, originating at the Pearl Harbor Officer’s Club, at the esteemed Royal Hawaiian Hotel Monarch Room, complete with Las Vegas-style plumes, glitter and rhinestones.
From the 1960s to the ‘80s, Cione operated a variety of night spots, all over Waikiki, most with risqué fare. So, he became a hot entity on the liquor commission agenda, and I remember him back in the day, when he would call the papers or TV stations that he would be arrested…to achieve publicity. The laws, prior to statehood, didn’t flag nudity in nighttime shows, so the rules had to be updated.
Cione always had a flair for themed shows, so he generated all-Asian, all-Black and even an ice show.
With clubs in his past, he turned to authoring, penning “What Do You Say to a Naked Waiter?” all about the making and marketing of his Dunes noontime attraction. The mid-‘70s book, was a must-see, must-read for many (it was sold on Amazon), and this opened a new career for Cione: luncheon speaker.
In 2014, Cione did another book, “Repotting Can Be Such a Bitch,” the repotting referring to a change in life and livelihood. The contents include remembrances of his glorious past as an entertainer himself as well as his brushes with the famous over his 50-year career.
He felt he had one more volume in his veins, a revisit to the naked waiters, which included nude phots of the servers plus a sex-survey with women commenting on their sex lives. It wasn’t a book worth doing – he showed me the text – and I advised him not to publish the book, for fear of damage and impact on the waiters who by then were aging adults and families.
Cioneis survived by his son Stephan and daughter-in-law Anne.
And that’s Show Biz…