Page 4 - MidWeek Kauai - July 6, 2022

4 KAUA‘I MIDWEEK JULY 6, 2022
From the comfort of their home offices, Yunji de Nies and Ryan Kalei Tsuji broad- cast Spotlight Hawai‘i, a live, digi- tal news program that airs at 10:30 a.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays on Honolulu Star-Adver- tiser’s Facebook page.
and Tsuji, they serve as the book- ing agent, hair and makeup artist, IT department, sound engineer, re- searcher and more. Not to mention, they’re the hosts of the show, too.
“They have more people making their graphics than who’s on our whole team,” says de Nies with a laugh.
“We were really surprised that we won the year before and we were even more surprised that we won twice this year,” says de Nies, smiling. “You kind of just submit it and then forget about it because it seems like such a long shot, es- pecially this particular award be- cause we’ re competing with such high-level programs.”
extremely humbling, flattering and honoring to be mentioned in the same breath as those wonder- ful news magazines and programs, and to be able to bring that home to Hawai‘i is always such a blessing and honor.”
There are no studio lights or high-tech cameras. There’s no pro- ducer, director or teleprompter op- erator, either. It’s just de Nies and Tsuji delivering quality local news content, from their homes to yours.
What’s perhaps even more im- pressive, Spotlight Hawai‘i re- cently won two Telly Awards, an international recognition that hon- ors video and television across all screens.
In fact, the show — which is widely applauded for its ability to ask guests questions from viewers right then and there — won a Tel- ly two years in a row (in 2021, it received an award for an episode featuring then-mayoral candidates Rick Blangiardi and Keith Amemi- ya), which serves as a testament to de Nies and Tsuji’s drive, hard work and inherent talent, especially considering that the show was only established a little more than two years ago.
Tsuji adds, “It’s always just mind-blowing to me because the Tellys are a very respected award on an international stage. It’s hard to believe that we’ re filming this from our homes and that we’re competing with some of the big names on the big networks, so it’s
One of the award-winning epi- sodes featured Lt. Gov. Josh Green (it premiered Aug. 20, 2021), who expounded on the delta variant surge, which was, at the time, sweeping the nation. Also earning a nod was a Dec. 10, 2021, show, during which Board of Water Sup- ply’s chief engineer, Ernest “Ernie” Lau, offered information about the
One can imagine how incredible the feat is, then, to operate a state- wide streaming news service as a two-person crew. Between de Nies
A “low production, high infor- mation” program, as de Nies de- scribes it, Spotlight Hawai‘i was in the company of colossal networks like CBS, which won for 60 Min- utes, and MSNBC (Afghanistan: The War at Home) this year.
SEE PAGE 5
Why are Ryan Kalei Tsuji and Yunji de Nies smiling so much these days? Probably because their triweekly streaming show ‘Spotlight Hawai‘i’ just earned them two Telly Awards.