The Faber Pocket Guide to Musicals by James Inverne

Author:James Inverne [James Inverne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780571268665
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Published: 2010-02-26T16:00:00+00:00

TRIVIA

This was producer Cameron Mackintosh’s heyday, a time when the British – and although Schönberg and Boublil are French their shows were British-produced – were dominating the genre. With so much money flying about there was plenty of extravagance, and Mackintosh’s flamboyant after-show parties were looked forward to almost as much as the shows themselves. Privileged attendees of the London Saigon opening were sailed down the Thames in Vietnamese barges.

THE PLOT

Towards the end of the Vietnam War, a Saigon nightclub owner and pimp known as the Engineer is anxiously getting his girls ready to perform in his club’s beauty contest – the girl named ‘Miss Saigon’ for the night will be won by one of his American GI customers. It is the virginal Kim’s first night working there.

A Marine, John, tries to cheer up his friend Chris by buying him a girl for the night – Chris refuses until he sees Kim. During the course of a night, they fall in love. After Kim tells Chris how her village was burned and her parents died, he asks her to live with him in America. She arranges a wedding ceremony (somewhat to his surprise) – which is interrupted by Kim’s arranged fiancé Thuy. As the two men face off, Kim tells Thuy to leave.

Three years later we meet Thuy once more, now an official for the new Vietnamese government. He has tracked down the Engineer, who in turn finds Kim for him. Kim, abandoned by Chris, reveals to Thuy the son she keeps hidden. Shocked, he orders her to kill the boy, but Kim shoots Thuy dead. She begs the Engineer to take her and the baby to America to find Chris – and the pimp, realising that a half-American child is as good as a passport to his beloved US, agrees. The trio board a ship and leave Vietnam.

Meanwhile, John now works for an organisation devoted to helping the children of American soldiers and Vietnamese women (Bui-Doi). He tells Chris – now married to an American woman named Ellen – that he has discovered Kim’s whereabouts, working for the Engineer in Bangkok, and that she has a son. Chris’s son. Ellen, Chris and John head for Bangkok.

Once there John tries to tell Kim that Chris is married but is unable to go through with it. He promises that Chris will visit her soon. As she prepares, alone, the spectre of Thuy appears to remind her of the time Chris left her alone. Cue a flashback of the night Saigon fell, as Chris is trapped in the Embassy, fails to reach her on the phone and is airlifted out against his will.

Unable to bear the wait any longer Kim goes to find Chris. She encounters Ellen instead and realises the full truth. She returns home to tell her son that his father will give him a better life and, as Chris arrives, she shoots herself, dying in his arms. Ellen embraces the child.

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