Saigon, Never Bygone In Mackintosh's Record-breaking World

The Age

Friday March 23, 2007

Robin Usher

CAMERON Mackintosh is the Ian Thorpe of musicals. He has broken so many records -such as being the only producer to have four shows running for more than 10 years -that his achievements are unlikely to be surpassed.

He acknowledges some help along the way, not least his association with composer Andrew Lloyd Webber. But he remains remarkably modest about his achievements.

"Andrew and I happened to be the right people around at the right time," he says. "We just happened to fall on some great stories."

The two first worked together on Cats in 1981, which became the longest-running show in Broadway history until overtaken last January by the second of their collaborations, The Phantom of the Opera.

In between, he produced Les Miserables in 1985, which has now overtaken Cats as the world's longest-running musical. He expects this title will eventually fall to The Phantom.

Mackintosh, who has been a producer for 40 of his 60 years, is in Melbourne for the premiere of a new production of his fourth record-breaking show, Miss Saigon, which first opened in London in 1989 and is Britain's third most successful musical.

He describes these shows as "amazing economic engines" that allowed him to run an Australian office in Sydney until 1999. "You need to have two or three hits to justify the expense," he says.

A bigger production of Miss Saigon ran in Sydney for 16 months in 1995, but no other theatre in Australia at the time was big enough to stage it.

Another reason against moving was the cost - estimated at more than $1.5 million a week. "It was a very expensive production and I could never afford to do anything like that again," Mackintosh says.

Even so, he was "very happy" with the profits from the sale of more than 760,000 tickets.

He decided to reinvent the show on a more economic scale. It costs about $4 million, compared to the original's $15 million, and touring productions have already been a hit in Britain in the US. The Australian co-producers are Michael Coppel and Louise Withers.

"I love the new version because I think we have heightened the potency of the love story at the heart of the show," he says.

Mackintosh hopes to be back in Australia in two years' time with the musical Mary Poppins that he produced with Disney. "I would also love to see my production of My Fair Lady come here," he says.

Miss Saigon opens at Her Majesty's Theatre next Thursday. Book on 1300 795 012.