Art for Kid’s Sake
Jean Rolles’ passion for the arts leads her to bring a Kennedy Center production to Hawaii schoolkids. It was the first time the Kennedy Center Theater for Young Audiences has made it to Hawaii, and it all happened thanks to the purse and passion of local arts supporter Jean Rolles.
By Alice Keesing
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Jean Rolles’ passion for the arts leads her to bring a Kennedy Center production to Hawaii schoolkids
They’ve got the blues at Benjamin Parker Elementary in Kaneohe. They’ve got them over the hill at Kalihi Uka. And down the highway at Pearl City Highlands. They all got the blues from Willie the Bluesman, a git-tar pickin’ character who came to the Islands as part of the national tour of the musical play Blues Journey.
It was the first time the Kennedy Center Theater for Young Audiences has made it to Hawaii, and it all happened thanks to the purse and passion of local arts supporter Jean Rolles.
Rolles picked up the tab to bring the actors to the Islands; she paid for the local set production, the lighting and even the school buses to bring the kids to the auditorium at McKinley High School. Thanks to her, about 1,800 elementary school students from Oahu and another 1,000 on Maui got the rare chance to see a national production and learn about the music at the heart of America’s history.
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Rolles sat in the audience herself at McKinley and watched as the students took in the story of Willie the Bluesman.
“We have limited opportunities here for the students because the school system has had to shut down most of the arts programs,” Rolles says. “Seeing live theatre, it really helps kids learn in another way. And if the kids don’t get exposed to this, they don’t know it’s there.”
Rolles comes from one of Hawaii’s well-known families, the Kelleys, who own and operate the Outrigger chain of hotels. In 1959, she and husband Chuck Rolles started the original Chuck’s Steak House, which developed into a chain of 50 restaurants throughout the country. In 1982 she joined the family business, where she is now vice president for community relations.
Rolles is a petite lady, but she has a gargantuan reputation in the business world and the community at large. The list of boards that she has served on is long - from the East-West Center to the Nature Conservancy of Hawaii to the YWCA of Oahu. She has also given her personal time and support to everyone from the Wahine volleyball team to the Honolulu Boy Choir to Iolani Palace, where she has worked as a volunteer docent for three decades. She still gives tours every month on Kama’aina Sundays.
Among her wide interests, Rolles says the arts have a special place.
“I have a personal pas-
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