The Point After "Hawaii's Legendary Disco"

“You can score at the point after”

The Point After was located in the Hawaiian Regent, 2552 Kalakaua Avenue.

It was the nightlife hub of Waikiki and opened at 9:00 pm and closed at 4:00 am every day with the last call at 3:30 am. It was known for its live music, crowds, good dance floor action, but the life of it was the experience and that Live music was the key. Such a popular place with the lines on the weekends and the cover charge would add up so people would save up to go dancing. There was a Point Pet VIP card to get past the cover charge, the 2 hour lines, and it would avoid the whole thing and go and have fun. It didn’t matter too much though, because they were packing people in and were way over the maximum allowed number. It was so popular it was like the Studio 54 of Hawaii with Stevie Wonder jamming and other people going under the radar. The way people would dress was in Angel Flight pants that clung to all their parts, nice long sleeved collared shirts, Members Only jackets, Famolares, Obsession cologne, and their hair was styled cut in layers, and people were super particular about their “look”.

"Could you get past the 2nd Floor of the Hawaiian Regent would be something people would ask, because the excitement and noise from it would compel people to come in. On the 3rd Floor was the restaurant "The Third Floor" where it was much more romantic with a getaway like vibe, but only if you could pass the second floor. It was like a challenge at times for those who knew what was there."

Waikiki’s Neighborhood would be replaced with Waikiki Urbanization to the tenth degree and much of the live music entertainment being considered old with the dancing entertainment of dancing taking over with disco. Since statehood this would be the most predominant time with Disco taking over the bars, new discotheques, and many converting to a late night dance club transition as locals were looking for faster songs, danceable songs, and city roots that were hard to come by with the Hawaiian music classics. Recorded music was technologically cool and the disc jockeying scene was ever so cool with vinyls that would keep people on the dance floor for years to come.

This is one popular teen get-together venue that had people in Angel Flight pants, long sleeve silky shirt, and Famolare roller coaster shoes from Liberty House. The Point After was a place to be seen and hope to be scooped up by the right someone by design, people could walk around all night, sit across the room and chill if they wanted to or hit the dance floor. There was a bar at each end of the club and a pair of dance floors and a stage in the center. People used the term "float" as they would go out or send a “radar” friend especially in girl circles to scope out who was at the club and report back to their squad. The lines were “come here a lot?”? “You’re a good dancer”, “So you come here often?”, “So do you have any friends here that could hang with my friends?”, “Wanna get high?”, “I drive a corvette”, “what are you drinking?”, “I’ll have what you’re having”. There was a restaurant above The Point After called “The Third Floor”, so many couples that already got together would eat there first and then head to the “The Point After”, well, after dinner.

A confident guy named Haku would go up one night and walk up to a girl and be like “in the front hu? Wanna boogie with me?”, or another local boy Billy a bit on the bigger side walk up to a pretty girl with bell bottoms and asked that one “eh sistah, like dance?”, and then there was Dean who went and asked the prettiest girl in the room "wanna dance"? and her response, "I got a drink already. Wait, what? yeah". A lot of guys were afraid of rejection because it was a expected for a guy to take the fall with the invite and if a girl said no it meant disaster for some, but to those who were on the prowl they would say “Next?” and years later the kids still saying that because it meant for now not forever if the person said no, because who else going walk up asking?

There was a NightClub agreement to a double standard that Men would be charged at the door and women got in free. On this day those who would want equal rights would likely scream "foul" if they were charged to go in and men weren't, and question it if men were charged and women weren’t. It was unspoken that the men accepted it for the chance at getting action. Lots of underage people were getting through because they knew someone or were just really attractive and what have you, but Waikiki was pretty safe considering all the drunks at the time. Getting into the club with all the adults was very exciting at the time for many with disco being in full swing at the time.

The Logo for The Point After was from a reference in the 1960’s with the kicker for the old Boston Patriots made iconic from Gino Capelettis silhouette that was used as the design. The logo on the match book was shaped like a football helmet, but when you opened it there were three blank lines for names and phone numbers that was the score card that you got that night. The people going there to score would compare their scorecards back in the day and if they were hitting the night clubs they would leave early, because they would have to start the night early scoring. There was this one guy who would cross out the names after he scored that night and would go back to the club and score again and the most he scored was two match books on a friday night with three of them all coming back to his place at the same time.

The Waitresses would wear sheer black stockings, a black leotard, and some even football jerseys with their high heels, because they wanted all the money they could get from the guys. It seemed when you took care of your look and made sure that the eyes were on you that the extra money would come to you very quickly. There was a lot of cash so they carried a pouch for cash sales because guys who like look like to spend too, mostly because they wish they get chance poke squid, but the wait staff would be laughing as they knew they had no chance. The staff would be hired and report to Tufi who was built and make sure no trouble would stir the staff. There were training sessions before they began and they needed to call out their drinks for the bartender in a certain order. They would serve the drinks on a tray that would light up to show off the colors of the tropical drinks to make it known that someone was ordering it making it enticing for a customer to order one themselves. The order of drinks would be: bourbon, scotch, gin, vodka, rum, brandy, tequila. Bar always slammed and the Cocktail waitresses were always nice despite being touched, pawed at, and called out to by drunk guys.

The casual uniforms were when they were changed to brown tank tops and tan snap up midis.

The Bathrooms had the guys checking out their hair and took out their comb to “bring their A game”, because they knew if they kept trying one of the girls would say yes. Women bathroom had toiletries, pink goods, anything really a girl needed to “freshen up” so it wouldn’t be unusual to tip $1 for mouthwash, hairspray, perfume, and whatnot. The smart guys lined up along the wall checking out the talent and as you pass by they ask you to dance, while the smart girls had their crew looking out for the nicest catch in the place that fit the mood of the night and those would be the lucky guys who were getting some extra luck that evening.

At the bar there was the Long Island Iced Teas, Mai Tai’s, Singapore Slings, Black and White Russians, Chivas, and the like. Certain drinks when ordered there was a Point After shot glass where you could keep the glass in black and another one in red. The Long Island Iced Teas came in buckets where customers could keep the glass, but some would just leave them there and they would be collected after the night was over. The drinks were good and the vibe was so good people wouldn’t keep track of their drinking as they would keep on choosing whatever they were in the mood for. It would be pretty normal to come in with a couple of friends in case it was hard to leave, because people would be stumbling out of there and have a hard time walking down the stairs. They would even forget a few times what floor they were parked on.

The Doorman and bouncers dressed up in suits and looked nice. They were Ramon “Ray” Ricardo, Joe Mayo, and others as they would be greeted by general manager Lee Afuvai. They were good when there was trouble around because some scary guys would be harassing the girls and they would make some excuse to leave to make the dude head outside and they would actually be hiding behind the bouncer trying to get away from the scary guy. While the people went home the employees or some of them would head over to Bobby McGees to wind down when they were pau work. People would head outside of the Night clubs and the sun would be coming up already, so they would walk across to the beach and watch the moonlight turn into a sunrise with their friends or if they were lucky their new honey. This would be followed by breakfast as the sun came up on that new day at one of the Afterhours meal spots: Wailana Coffee House, Like Like Drive In, Coco’s, Zippy’s, KC Drive Inn, and Annamillers.

The Dancers would be the people who would be expected to draw crowds and they were known as being guests to come in for free and skip the line. The bouncer would only do this for the best dancers and see them and look over people to wave them in because they were the best dancers. Every Monday night they had a dance contest for $100.00 on the slow night, to get people to come in. There was this Hawaiian girl there that could just kill it on the dance floor solo and got even better when dancing as a pair, but not to say they were the only ones there was everyone representing on the dance floor. All sorts of locals dancing and grooving and having a good time and getting excited from the national hit that went popular globally “Saturday Night Fever” really pumped things into overdrive. Back in the day there would be dance offs with the foreign black brothas and the Hawaiian boyz and man. They were impressed with the people from Hawaii as they had style in a different way from where they were from in New York and folks like Ailona Stucchi showed off moves on the dance floor that set Hawaii apart.

The U.H FootBall team would look forward to the night life after the games, because their girlfriends would change from stadium wear into their fancy dresses and meet up at The Point After. They would dance all night, and eat after, then cab back to the dorm. Those who worked at other night clubs would often head there after their shift ended and also those who worked at the entertainment shows like the Don Ho Show where they spent many nights at the Point After.

If people weren’t busy taking shots after dancing they would be in the back, a small area where people were sometimes doing all kinds of psychedelics with funny conversations or pretending they were a bowling ball being all silly like that.

Many people who went got all upset when the legal age was changed from 18 (until 1986) to 21 with Hawaii being the last hold out of all the states. The governor changed it to 21 because he wanted the federal funding for highways and changed the legal drinking age to get the money.

Stan Richards

Lee Afuvai (General Manager), was the man in charge

He flew “T's Big Band Hawaii” a 16-piece band, to American Samoa for New Years Eve one year to play at the Raintree Hotel where the Governor came for a short vist, but stayed the whole night.

Herbert “Berbie” Vine

Francis Apoliona (General Manager)

TJ the DJ and George the Greek would be spinning vinyls.

"Big Rick" Kahalehau or FOF to some

Bartender "Mr. Little Riki" Sugimoto

Pulefano Tufi

“For whom a sucking pig was a personal pupu” - John Berger

Dancetta the “Hawaiian Disco Dancing Queen”,

All sorts of local celebrities could be found there like Mackey Feary would be hanging out with Noe and Nani as the disco ball would reflect the light all over the club.

Maurice White (Earth Wind and Fire), OJ Simpsons, Wilt Chamberlain (NBA),

Live Performances were still alive and kicking with: Phase 7, Aura (Nomads), Greenwood “The Army”, PowerPoint, Union Pacific, Krystal Klear, Beowolf, Zulu, T's Big Band Hawaii, Rolando Sanchez, Friends & Brothers