Miss Saigon - Theatre Royal / Prince Edward / UK Tour

I've just watched this video on Cats by youtuber Lindsay Ellis, who makes some very insightful essay videos on musical films like Phantom. Well worth a watch but the last 5 minutes sums up why I don't want a Miss Saigon movie, or even Hamilton for that matter.

She mentions how much of the big film musicals since Moulin Rouge and Chicago have been Oscar bait films (the added unnecessary song, the casting of celebrities and so on). Except the Oscars nowadays prefer films set in realism which made Tom Hooper a shoe-in with his need to make Les Mis and Cats realistic.

Is there still a market for musical films. Sure, but if you want a film that's true to the source material then don't expect Hollywood to make one and they are certainly unable to make a Miss Saigon film

"It's what all the girls sing at weddings".

Thank you, but I know what a straw man looks like.

I also know colonialist arrogance when I hear it. The choice to use made-up words in that moment was appalling, lazy, and absolutely unjustifiable. Try to frame it whatever way you like, but some things are simply wrong.

Times have changed. The whole world has changed.
And yes, this causes little details here and there to be adjusted.

Now it's fixed, so you can choose to applaud it, or to keep complaining about these details that once were.
Same goes for yellowface casting. Once accepted. Today we live in a different world.

All those things are progress. But claiming today that: "Kim shoots herself over race. This show is about "whiteness kills you". Kim chooses Chris over Thuy because of race. The casting is yellowface." Is racist and moving backwards. That's not fair and has nothing to do with the show how it is today.

It's racist for Diep Tran to complain about the way white writers chose to portray a character from her own country and culture?

Please explain how. It's been a long few months and I could really use a laugh.

And if anybody mentions, La La Land had the advantage of being a call-back to the old stylistic musical films. The Oscars love call-back films like The Artist

ANTHONY MINGHELLA!!!
i honestly thought they were the same person!

First, "white writers", is a racist and world alienated remark. This says nothing about the story, the boat people, refugees and bargirls and the story of madame butterfly this is based on. But I think you hit the nail on its head there. The writer of that article is racist and this given is her problem per definition. She just hates white people. 

If you really want a laugh, look at these remarks in the article:
"Kim shoots herself over race. This show is about "whiteness kills you". Kim chooses Chris over Thuy because of race."

Secondly, she says: "Asian women are resilient, resourceful, strong, not victims. Instead, in Miss Saigon, Kim, a woman with no last name, sings about her longing for a man to save her".

If you weren't laughing loud enough I'm sure you do it now. Of course it's bizarre to hate white people and hate a show were a character is not embodying your perfect fantasy person or doesn't have the job she feels that represents her well enough, but you know, characters are not meant to represent a whole group of people or an ego. This is a story about a bargil, and many of them existed. The thing is, Kim is everything she describes (resilient, strong, not a victim) and fights till the end for her son, so she clearly hasn't seen the show. She just wants to diss white people. In reality most bargirls and boat people were probably not nearly as heroic or strong, but the writers chose to make her a strong heroine. But that's ok. It is still believable and that's what counts, even when the story is partially real and partially fiction.

Nope, it doesn't make any sense at all. We have spent too much time and attention on that racist article.

Let's contribute to the movie director discussion and other Miss Saigon stuff.

Whilst talking about racism in this thread it is also worth noting that;

American Soldiers were sent to the Vietnamese villages to win the locals hearts and minds, unfortunately it was the Vietnamese that won the heart and minds through prostitution and opium, essentially what Miss Saigon is about. The American soldiers were conscripted and were mainly not like Chris but John, by being black as a lot of white Americans avoided the draft, just as the current President did.

What Miss Saigon did well and that was make America finally take ownership of the problems they left behind and that was the Bui Doi children the ‘dust of life,’ who were despised and abhorred in Vietnam, ‘conceived by a pig,’ It made the president At the time of Miss Saigon and I believe it to be George Bush Senior, to allow the Bui Doi generation to settle in America and start a life a new, one that is free, peaceful and not judged..

I too saw in in Kristina at the Royal Albert Hall singing the part of Robert, Kristina's brother and I agree, an incredible voice.

Oh Kristina, gold can turn to sand

Miss Saigon is coming to Netflix on 16th November. Assume its the filmed London revival