I saw Miss Saigon this evening with Kitty and her sister. It was a live stage production in San Mateo, put on by Broadway by the Bay. It was a bit of a letdown to be honest - I'd heard so much about how good it's supposed to be, a poignant update on the classic Madame Butterfly - because the lyrics were just clunky. The rhymings seemed so...forced. Very formulaic. Perhaps that's just because the Madame Butterfly story has been so overproduced here lately that it's impossible to see it afresh even after it's been moved to Vietnam.

I can't fault the singers; they were excellent. Kitty's sister was disappointed in the singing because she thought "it'd be more like Phantom of the Opera" but that has little to do with the quality of the performances and much to do with a lack of experience with musical theatre, I think.

Costumes were good; the sets superb. No one could complain about the helicoptor scene - the special effects were far better than I'd thought us likely to get outside of San Francisco.

This is such a short and lazy notice. I'm not doing much to explain my opinions at all.

We were late, and missed the first half hour. That may contribute to my unhappiness with the production. But I honestly was impressed with the production, the actors and Broadway by the Bay. It was just the musical itself I wasn't into.