“This production does full justice to Miss Saigon.”
Miss Saigon has arrived at the King’s Theatre, Glasgow, and it has not done so quietly. Boublil and Schönberg’s landmark musical, following the romance between American GI Chris and young Vietnamese woman Kim against the devastation of the fall of Saigon, remains one of the most emotionally unrelenting works in the canon. This touring production makes no attempt to soften that. It shouldn’t.
The score is, simply, extraordinary. Boublil and Schönberg construct a musical world of real sweep and sophistication – from the anguished intimacy of Sun and Moon to the sheer spectacle of The American Dream, from the tenderness of Last Night of the World to the gut-punch of the finale. What strikes you is how the music holds contradiction: it is lush and brutal simultaneously, capable of beauty in the same breath as devastation. It earns every emotion it asks of you.
Jean-Pierre van der Spuy’s direction is among the production’s most quietly impressive achievements. His vision is one of precision and intention. There is no padding, no filler, no sense of time being killed while the crew works behind a curtain. The darkness is never gratuitous; it is laced with humanity. Updated without being sanitised and relevant without being preachy, his choices are consistently heartbreaking, which, for a story of this weight, is exactly as it should be.
Andrew D. Edwards’ set and costume design is, frankly, astonishing. As the show opens, Saigon breathes and pulses around you – and then, with seemingly effortless fluidity, transforms: Bangkok, America, the rooftop of a falling city. What is remarkable is not just the technical ambition, but the feeling it creates. There is a lingering nostalgia to Edwards’ aesthetic, a sense that we are watching a world already half-lost even as it lives. No corners were cut. The costumes carry the same rigour – period, character and place rendered with a care that deepens every scene.
Bruno Poet’s lighting design works not merely in service of the action but in active conversation with it – shaping mood, isolating grief, amplifying joy with equal craft. George Reeve’s projections are where the production makes one of its boldest statements: documentary-like, stark, rooted in the visual language of photojournalism. They pull us clean out of any sense of theatrical fantasy and remind us, unflinchingly, that this is history.
At the centre of it all, Julianne Pundan and Jack Kane are exceptional. Their chemistry is entirely convincing – you believe in these two people completely – and their voices, individually and together, soar. Last Night of the World is luminous; you can see them come alive on stage, the scene finding a warmth and a fragility that makes what follows all the more devastating. It is hard to believe it is Pundan’s theatrical debut. She brings such groundedness, such instinctive, unforced humanity to Kim, with a native charm, an innocence, and a sweetness that cannot be manufactured. Kane, meanwhile, brings real arc to Chris – angry, fiery, passionate, but crucially, changed. The distance between the Chris of Act One and the man we meet three years later is rendered with an authenticity that feels entirely lived-in.
Seann Miley Moore’s Engineer is, in a word, a showstopper. Charming, wickedly funny and utterly commanding, Moore takes the character and makes it entirely their own – imbuing it with such specific, irrepressible energy that the audience is, quite simply, in the palm of their hand. The American Dream sequence is sensational: Moore owns every inch of the stage, and delivers it with a voice and a stage presence that no amount of words can quite do justice to. A genuine talent, seen here at full force.
The ensemble, too, deserve their moment. The sheer scale of the company brings with it something you cannot simulate. The military choreography is exceptional: rigorous, kinetic, and precisely timed without ever losing its humanity. The helicopter scene – Chris forced to abandon Kim as civilians surge desperately towards the ascending aircraft – is one of the most genuinely chilling pieces of theatre you are likely to see this year.
Miss Saigon remains a difficult, essential, extraordinary piece of work. This production does it full justice. Do not miss it. Miss Saigon runs until 20th June before continuing the tour across the UK. Tickets are available here.