The Hawaii theater community is mourning the loss of Ronald E. “Ron” Bright, a Hilo native who became a legendary drama teacher and theater director at Castle High School in Kaneohe, Oahu.
The 81-year-old Bright, who taught for 50 years and founded the Castle Performing Arts Center, died Tuesday at Castle Medical Center on Oahu. The theater was renamed the Ronald E. Bright Performing Arts Center in 1994.
In a Wednesday statement, Gov. David Ige hailed Bright as “one of those teachers who had a unique, gentle, energizing and contagious spirit that inspired his students to strive for excellence and to believe in themselves.”
“He put his students first, and he gave them the confidence to achieve more than they thought they could,” Ige said. “He was a role model for all public school teachers.”
Bright, who came from a musical family, loved to sing and play piano, and inspired many students to go on to professional theater careers, including his son, Michael Bright, who toured nationally with the musical “Miss Saigon.”
Jackie Pualani Johnson, a drama professor at the University of Hawaii at Hilo, said Bright “set the bar for the rest of us.”
“For many of us in the theater, he was doing it long before any of us realized what the future would hold for theater in the state of Hawaii,” Johnson said. “I saw his students performing in ‘Miss Saigon’ on Broadway. There was a handful of his students, and they turned heads. They were well-trained and they were superb.”
Suzi Bond, executive director of the Big Island’s Kilauea Drama and Entertainment Network, described Bright as “brilliant, kind and giving.”
“He was a dynamo as far as dramatic arts education in the Hawaii schools,” said Bond. “He helped put drama education into the schools in Hawaii and it’s a big, big loss for us all.”
Bright, who also was known as “Mr. B.” and “Poppo,” retired in 1998 as a public school teacher, but later directed 13 musicals at Windward Community College’s Paliku Theater, including “The Phantom of the Opera,” “Les Miserables” and “Miss Saigon.”
Other survivors include Bright’s wife, Moira, who often collaborated with him on shows, another son, Clarke, who is bandmaster of the Royal Hawaiian Band, daughter Jodi Bright Stein and seven grandchildren.
Funeral arrangements are pending.
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.