Behind and beyond Miss Saigon
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Behind and beyond Miss Saigon

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

When Takonkiat Viravan's Thai adaptation of Miss Saigon opens at Ratchadalai Theatre tomorrow, the date is precisely 23 years and one week after the world-renowned musical's premier in London on Sept 20, 1989.

Lea Salonga played Kim in the original West End production of Miss Saigon . This picture from 1991 was taken when the musical was played in Manila.

Adapting Broadway musicals is nothing new to Thai theatres. The past decade alone saw several adaptations of Broadway by Thai troupes, ranging from Fame and Dreamgirls by Dreambox, Man of La Mancha and La Cage Aux Folles by Takolkiat's Scenario, as well as quality productions such as Cabaret, Pippin, Chicago, and Hedwig by Bangkok University's Drama department.

Undoubtedly the real challenge was staging a Thai version of Miss Saigon, one of the musical megahits of 1980s. Highlights of this multimillion-dollar production include a sleazy nightclub in the opening scene, a helicopter landing on stage during evacuation, and a parade by communist troops after the Vietnam War. Like many previous translated adaptations, this production aims not only to thrill the local audience to experience Western gems in Thai language, but also to challenge producers and local talents on how well they can handle Western theatrical craft.

But for Scenario's Miss Saigon, aficionados can't help but raise the big question: who will perform the vocally-demanding role of Kim, a 17-year-old Vietnamese in a tragic romance with American GI during the war?

In the original West End production, the producers scoured many countries searching for the female lead until they landed in the Philippines and found two potential "Kim": Lea Salonga and Monique Wilson, both childhood friends and fellow Repertory Philippines performers. The 17-year-old soprano child star, Salonga was eventually offered the lead role and her friend became her understudy. This paved a way for Salonga in her international career that has spanned over two decades, including her work in Walt Disney's animations.

In an interview with the Bangkok Post in 2008, Salonga believed that she was at the right place at the right time to get to play this legendary role. Now a mother of a six-year-old daughter, Salonga said that it was not easy anymore to perform a heart-wrenching, motherly love number, I'd Give My Life for You. ''But I cry a lot easier,'' she said.

A mother's ultimate sacrifice is the central theme for Miss Saigon. The musical was originally inspired by a photograph of a sad-looking Vietnamese mother leaving her child to board a plane to live with her father, an ex-GI, for a better life in the US. The plot is also an artistic loan from a doomed romance involving an Asian woman abandoned by her American lover in Giacomo Puccini's opera Madame Butterfly.

In the world of Thai theatre, a similar tragedy of an ill-fated 15-year-old girl from Nagasaki, Ciocio-san, was transformed into two Thai dramas: a literal adaptation of Madame Butterfly titled Jojo San and a localised version called Sao Krue Fah, in which a northern girl falls for a lieutenant from Bangkok.

From a gender-study perspective, the portrayal of Asian females as submissive characters while Caucasian males as dominant ones is regarded by many critics as sexism and racism. This is still largely unchanged in Miss Saigon _ even though David Henry Hwang had a sweet revenge when he wrote M. Butterfly in 1998, in which a Chinese opera performer-turned-spy seductively exploits a French diplomat to a tragic end.

Back to Scenario's Miss Saigon, the production features many newcomers and budding stars in their theatrical debut. To fulfill the highly demanding vocalisation, the actress needs to have powerful lungs and control over her soundscape in approximately 20 numbers. Director Takolkiat opts for a double cast featuring new-faced actresses, Kanda Witayanupabyuenyong and Kulkornpat Phothongnak. It also stars contestants from Scenario's The Star singing contest, including Napat ''Gun'' Injaiuea, Napassorn ''New'' Putornjai, and singers Chalatis Tantiwoot and Suweerat Boonrwad.

The awaiting challenge is to what extent they can help the musical soar, and whether or not the all-Thai-cast can convince the audience to believe in the conflicts between Caucasian and Asian characters, romantic and otherwise.

Speaking of race, it was actually a major issue for Miss Saigon when the West End production was set to start on Broadway in 1991. The Actors' Equity Association (AEA) in America opposed Jonathan Pryce, a white actor, to recreate the role of the Eurasian pimp as, according to AEA, ''the casting of a Caucasian actor made up to appear Asian is an affront to the Asian community.'' Filipina Lea Salonga's citizenship was also a problem as she was neither British nor American, so the AEA demanded the producer to cast its own members in the US. Ironically, the AEA was then criticised for violations of the principles of artistic integrity and freedom.

After the pressure from producer Cameron Mackintosh, who threatened to call off the show, the AEA was forced to reverse its decision. Pryce starred alongside Salonga when the show opened on Broadway and won the 1991 Tony Award, adding up to their 1989 Olivier awards. In fact, Salonga became the first actress from Asia to win the Olivier, Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics and Theatre World awards from the same role, a rarity in the history of Western theatre.

Taking a closer look, Miss Saigon has joined a small Asian-led musical bandwagon which includes The King and I, Flowers Drum Songs, and Pacific Overture, all of which feature Asian faces in the lead role.

Meanwhile, Thailand's capital, Bangkok, was used as a backdrop in a few Broadway musicals _ mainly in a negative light. It is cast as an uncivilised country in a fictional story between Anna Leonowen and King Mongkut in The King and I; a sex paradise for foreigners as performed in One Night in Bangkok from Chess, and a red-light district of Patpong on the stage of Miss Saigon.

After its official closing on Broadway in 1999 _ with over four thousand performances to its credit _ this musical represented Schonberg and Boublil's second major success, following Les Miserables in 1985. As of August this year, it is ranked by playbill.com as the 11th longest running musical on Broadway. It is currently licensing for production in Brazil and Australia. With the Scenario adaptation, Thailand will join other countries like Germany and The Netherlands which have adapted the production in their own language.

And like its counterparts The Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables _ which had to endure years of discussion before the film version appeared in 2004 and 2012 respectively _ Miss Saigon is expected to arrive in cinematic format soon. When this materialises, the key question will still be the same: who will be Miss Saigon?

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