'Miss Saigon' music tells tale

Music from the internationally acclaimed musical Miss Saigon will come alive at the Imperial Theatre this weekend.

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The Augusta Players' Bryan Hughes, of North Augusta, looks at the finishing touches to Shawna Masuda of Oahu, Hawaii, who was rehearsing to play Kim, the lead female role, in Miss Saigon.

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Willy Falk helped adapt Miss Saigon for American theater and will play the role of Chris at the Imperial Theater concert.

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Children perform African dance at Shiloh Community Center. Two African dance companies will perform Sunday in downtown Augusta for Arts in the Heart of Augusta.

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The Augusta Players opens its 66th season Friday and Saturday with the concert version of Miss Saigon , featuring Willy Falk, a Tony Award-nominated performer who created the role for the musical's original Broadway production.

Falk will star in the role of Chris alongside Shawna Masuda, a Hawaiian actress who will play the role of Kim.

Miss Saigon is a love story set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War. During the war's turmoil, an American soldier and a Vietnamese girl fall in love, only to be separated during the fall of Saigon.

Falk, an operatic tenor and Broadway performer, has traveled from New York to perform the role. This is the first time he has played the role of Chris since the musical premiered on Broadway in 1991 and he earned his Tony Award nomination. Miss Saigon had a 10-year run on Broadway.

There won't be fancy sets and a full cast of characters, but the audience will experience the drama of Miss Saigon through its songs, Falk said.

"The beauty of it is Miss Saigon is sung through. There's no dialogue in it. It's almost like a modern opera. Every part of it is set to music," Falk said.

Some people think that Miss Saigon is a musical about Vietnam, but "at its heart, it's a love story about how people can fall in love despite cultural and racial differences," he said. It also shows how the world sometimes interferes and breaks this love apart.

As the first person to play the role of Chris in Miss Saigon on Broadway, Falk worked with the musical's authors and director to offer input on how the role would be played. He even made a significant change in the storyline.

Previously, the musical had been performed in London and needed to be adapted for an American audience.

"We changed some lyrics and added a fight scene that was not in there before, which I had a lot to do with adding. There's a moment in the play when my character leaves his girlfriend behind in Saigon. I wanted to make it clear that he didn't want to. So there's a fight scene where he's sort of knocked out and dragged onto the helicopter," Falk said.

It was a much-anticipated show, he said.

"At the time, it had the largest financial advance of pre-sold tickets of any Broadway show," Falk said.

He also remembers the controversy surrounding the musical because it discussed the Vietnam War. Even his own godmother refused to see it, he said.

"It had huge press because of the protests that were going on surrounding it. I wish that she had seen it because she would have realized the subject matter is there, but it's really about the love story," he said.

Falk has appeared in operas, operatic concerts and musical theatre productions in the United States and abroad.