History Theatre / MissSaigon

The date is April 1975. A group of American Marines are out for one last night on the town, since they will be pulling out of Saigon soon. They visit a sleazy nightclub called "Dreamland" run by an HonestJohn known as '''[[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep The Engineer]]''', and populated by a number of hookers, including '''Kim''', a 17-year-old girl who would probably be TheIngenue if it weren't for her profession. She catches the eye of '''Chris''', one of the marines; his friend '''John''' makes the arrangements, and the OfficialCouple get together. However, after finding out that Kim is a HeartwarmingOrphan, [[PetTheDog Chris offers to take her back to America with him]]. Of course, this is easier said than done, since the [[CommieLand Vietcong]] are going to be moving in on Saigon in a matter of days. Even better, Kim and Chris' [[FourthDateMarriage Fourth-Date]] AccidentalMarriage is interrupted by '''Thuy''', joint victim of a ChildhoodMarriagePromise their parents made. Of course, Kim's parents are dead, she loves Chris, ''and'' Thuy has gone over to the DirtyCommunists, so Kim's not going for it. Thuy promises revenge and storms out again.

* TakeThat: At the end of the "American Dream" number, the Engineer begs the dancers to come back, saying, [[UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump "We can make it great again!"]]

* WhamShot: In "I Still Believe", we see Kim alone in a hovel. . .and Chris thousands of miles away in bed with his new wife. Aside from the confusion as to how they ended up like this, given that the last we saw of them was them blissfully happy, with this revelation, we know the show is going to end sadly somehow.

* ShoutOut: In the revival, one of the tourists that the Engineer greets during "What a Waste" is a [[Theatre/TheBookOfMormon gay Mormon missionary]].

** Even Chris gets a little of this. For all his {{Jerkass}} ways in ''Butterfly'', Pinkerton genuinely wants to make amends by taking his son to America. Chris on the other hand is willing to leave Tam in Vietnam. Even with the monetary support he's committed to making, he's still turning a blind eye to the bigotry the child will still face.

The date is April 1975. A group of American Marines are out for one last night on the town, since they will be pulling out of Saigon soon. They visit a sleazy nightclub called "Dreamland" run by an HonestJohn known as '''[[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep The Engineer]]''', and populated by a numbercity of hookers, including '''Kim''', a 17-year-old girl who would probably be TheIngenue if it weren't for her profession. She catches the eye of '''Chris''', one of the marines; his friend '''John''' makes the arrangements, and the OfficialCouple get together. However, after finding out that Kim is a HeartwarmingOrphan, [[PetTheDog Chris offers to take her back to America with him]]. Of course, this is easier said than done, since the [[CommieLand Vietcong]] are going to be moving in on Saigon in a matter of days. Even better, Kim and Chris' [[FourthDateMarriage Fourth-Date]] AccidentalMarriage is interrupted by '''Thuy''', joint victim of a ChildhoodMarriagePromise their parents made. Of course, Kim's parents are dead, she loves Chris, ''and'' Thuy has gone over to the DirtyCommunists, so Kim's not going for it. Thuy promises revenge and storms out again.

The date is April 1975. A group of American Marines are out for one last night on the town, since they will be pulling out of Saigon soon. They visit a sleazy nightclub called "Dreamland" run by an HonestJohn known as '''[[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep The Engineer]]''', and populated by a number of hookers, including '''Kim''', a 17-year-old girl who would probably be TheIngenue if it weren't for her profession. She catches the eye of '''Chris''', one of the marines; his friend '''John''' makes the arrangements, and the OfficialCouple get together. However, after finding out that Kim is a HeartwarmingOrphan, [[PetTheDog Chris offers to take her back to America with him]]. Of course, this is easier said than done, since the [[CommieLand Vietcong]] are going to be moving in on Saigon in a matter of days. Even better, Kim and Chris' [[FourthDateMarriage Fourth-Date]] AccidentalMarriage is interrupted by '''Thuy''', joint victim of a ChildhoodMarriagePromise their parents made. Of course, Kim's parents are dead, she loves Chris, ''and'' Thuy has gone over to the DirtyCommunists, so Kim's not going for it. Thuy promises revenge and storms out again.

* PleaseSelectNewCityName: Saigon actually ''was'' renamed Ho Chi Minh City. Most of its residents don't call it that, though.

''MadameButterfly'', TheMusical. Penned by the legendary composers of ''Theatre/LesMiserables'' (Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil), ''Miss Saigon'' is a reworking of Music/GiacomoPuccini's 1904 {{opera}} for more contemporary audiences, by [[RecycledINSPACE moving it to some new place]], specifically UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar (setting) and Broadway (venue).

* {{Expy}}: Virtually every main character is a recreation of his/her counterpart in ''MadameButterfly''.

->''"The heat is on in Saigon''\\

The date is April 1975. A group of American Marines are out for one last night on the town, since they will be pulling out of Saigon soon. They visit a sleazy nightclub called "Dreamland" run by an HonestJohn known as '''[[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep The Engineer]]''', and populated by a number of hookers, including '''Kim''', a 17-year-old girl who would probably be TheIngenue if it weren't for her profession. She catches the eye of '''Chris''', one of the marines; his friend '''John''' makes the arrangements, and the OfficialCouple get together. However, after finding out that Kim is a HeartwarmingOrphan, [[PetTheDog Chris offers to take her back to America with him]]. Of course, this is easier said than done, since the [[CommieLand Vietcong]] are going to be moving in on Saigon in a matter of days. Even better, Kim and Chris' [[FourthDateMarriage Fourth-Date]] AccidentalMarriage is interrupted by '''Thuy''', joint victim of a ChildhoodMarriagePromise their parents made. Of course, Kim's parents are dead, she loves Chris long time, ''and'' Thuy has gone over to the DirtyCommunists, so Kim's not going for it. Thuy promises revenge and storms out again.

Act Two opens in America, where John is deeply involved in an American charity organization that helps with the aftermath of the war, specifically, linking American fathers to their "bui doi" (interracial) children. He tells Chris about Kim and Tam, which leaves Chris in the uncomfortable position of telling Ellen exactly why he wakes up yelling Kim's name sometimes; the three travel to Bangkok for some sort of family reunion. (Meanwhile, we have a {{Flashback}} to the Fall Of Saigon, where it turns out that Chris did his darnedest to get Kim out with him; in fact, John had to punch him to keep him from not boarding the chopper.) Kim goes to Chris' hotel room but finds only Ellen, who is not unsympathetic to her plight but doesn't want to be second fiddle to one of her husband's byblows. Ellen issues Chris an ultimatum - [[TriangRelations her or me]] - and Chris agrees to limit his contact with Kim and Tam to monetary support sent from America. Of course, Kim isn't particularly happy about this, so once the Americans are at her front door, she takes the only action left her. The curtain falls.

* ILetGwenStacyDie

* CatapultNightmare: Chris bolts upright in bed after yet another bad dream about Kim. Depending on the actress, Kim herself often does this following her flashback to when she and Chris were separated during the fall of Saigon.

* AdaptationalHeroism: Pinkerton, Chris's counterpart in ''Madame Butterfly'', was a massive {{Jerkass}}. Chris in this musical is presented as more of a NiceGuy. Kim is also a massive upgrade over Cio-Cio San, losing the naivete and gaining the iron will that her counterpart lacked. The writers seem to have reasoned that Vietnam was such a tragedy on its own that they can offload all of the fault onto it. They're right -- nobody in the cast (save Thuy) is a bad person, and they're all doing the best they can, and it just ''doesn't matter'' because this horrible war and its horrible end just came in like a force of nature and rolled over them all. This gives the tragedy a truly nasty sting that was lacking from the source material.

** At the end of the "American Dream" number, the Engineer begs the dancers to come back, saying, "We can make it great again!"

''MadameButterfly'', TheMusical. Penned by the legendary composers of ''Theatre/LesMiserables'' (Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil), ''Miss Saigon'' is a reworking of Music/GiacomoPuccini's 1904 {{opera}} for more contemporary audiences, by [[RecycledINSPACE moving it to some new place]], specifically TheVietnamWar (setting) and Broadway (venue).

* HoYay: During the "What A Waste" scene, one of the scantily-clad, gyrating prostitutes is a ''man''. Additionally, the Mormon missionary who spends the entire song acting disgusted at the Engineer's attempt to procure him a girl finally gives in when the Engineer offers ''himself'' up.

** Towards the end of the show's Broadway run, the role of Ellen, typically played by a white actress (specifically, a blonde or redhead) was cast with Margaret Ann Gates, who is Asian, resulting in a likely example of the ReplacementGoldfish trope--it now seemed as though Chris married Ellen only because she reminded him of Kim, rather than to move on with his life.