The Kallang Theatre, Singapore. August 1st to 30th September, 2001

 

____________________________ Saigon heat in Singapore

 Article by the now defunct, PROJECT EYEBALL newspaper

Written by Tan Dawn Wei

12th April 2001

''THE heat is on in Saigon,'' goes the song from the long-running musical, Miss Saigon.

Come August, the heat wave will hit Singapore instead. So hopes IMG Arts & Entertainment, the producer of the show opening at the Kallang Theatre on Aug 1.

It's been a long time coming, considering the other big three musicals - Phantom Of The Opera, Les Miserables and Cats - visited our shores years ago.

So what took Miss Saigon so long?

James Cundall, director of arts and entertainment at IMG, attributed the delay to the difficulty in securing consecutive venues in Hong Kong and Singapore, the Asian crisis and the unavailability of sets.

And now that it's finally here, the challenge may be about drawing Singaporeans to the theatre, many of whom may have seen the production overseas. But Cundall believes not.

And even if they have, Cundall promises that this production will be ''more genuine and up-to-date and an overall better performance because it's not beholden to union laws, such as those which stipulate you have to hire American actors, etc''.

Producers can draw from the best in the world, right down to members of the ensemble.

The cast, some of whom have performed on West End and Broadway, will come from more than half a dozen different countries. But only three Singaporeans have been sourced to be part of the production.

Said Filipino Leo Tavarro Valdez, who plays the role of the Engineer: ''Because of time constraints, we're not able to involve more Singaporeans.''

The multi-award-winning musical has become one of the best-loved musicals since it opened in London in 1989, and has been seen by 28 million people in eight different languages.

A love story based loosely on Puccini's Madam Butterfly, Miss Saigon is set during the final days of the Vietnam War.

It tells the story of Kim, a Vietnamese bar girl who meets and falls in love with a marine, Chris. But when Saigon falls, the two are separated, only to meet years later, when Chris returns with his wife, determined to take their son back to the US.

The musical has propelled Filipina Lea Salonga to stardom, but as for who will play the coveted roles of Kim and Chris in this production, Cundall is tight-lipped for now.

But yes, the helicopter's coming. As Cundall put it, ''Phantom has the chandelier, Cats has the rubbish heap, and Miss Saigon has the helicopter'', all 3,900 kg of it.

One of the musical's most spectacular scenes has an almost life-sized helicopter descending onto the stage, with its propeller whirring away.

Staging the US$7-million (S$12.6-million) large-scale production at Kallang Theatre was not without problems.

Cundall admitted that the theatre was not an easy venue to work with. ''Bits of the scenery could not fit into the lift, and we also had to knock a hole in the wall in the backstage and shove the sets through it,'' he said.

As for how the helicopter can get in, think lego bricks.

Miss Saigon will be at the Kallang Theatre from Aug 1. Ticket prices are $45 to $125 from Sistic (348 5555) available from May 16.