'Miss Saigon' returning to London stage in 2014

[June 20, 2013]  LONDON (AP) -- "Miss Saigon," the musical that brought a real helicopter onto the West End stage, is descending on London again.

Producer Cameron Mackintosh says a new production of Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg's musical will open at the Prince Edward Theatre in May, 25 years after the original production.

A Vietnam War love story inspired by Giacomo Puccini's "Madame Butterfly," "Miss Saigon" ran for a decade in London. On Broadway, it ran for 4,063 performances until 2000.

Mackintosh said Thursday that he had been working for a decade on a "re-imagined" new production, which "has taken a more gritty and realistic approach to the design than the operatic original but still delivers the power and epic sweep of Boublil and Schonberg's great score."

Tickets go on sale in September.

[Associated Press]

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.