Miss Saigon to return to West End in 2014

Miss Saigon was the second major success for Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg after Les Miserables.

Hit musical Miss Saigon is to return to London's West End in May of 2014, its 25th anniversary year.

Sir Cameron Mackintosh will bring Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg's musical to the Prince Edward Theatre.

The love story set during the Vietnam War is one of the most successful musicals and has been seen by more than 35 million people worldwide.

The new show will be a "re-imagined physical production" and will feature a new song by Boublil and Schonberg.

Sir Cameron reworked the show 10 years ago to enable it to play to more theatres.

"The new production 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," he said.

It has already toured the UK and a number of countries around the world, but Sir Cameron said he was waiting for the perfect theatre to become available to bring it back to the West End.

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Set in 1975, Miss Saigon is a love story about the relationship between an American GI and a young Vietnamese woman.

Sir Cameron said Miss Saigon was the one musical he had the most requests to bring back, but added he thought now was the right time.

"If anything the tragic love story of Miss Saigon has become even more relevant today," he said.

"In the last 25 years our country has become involved in similar wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in the way we weren't in Vietnam and the American Dream has been buffeted by the reality of recent history."

The new production will include the new song, entitled Maybe, sung by the character of Ellen in the second act.

It has been included in recent Dutch and Japanese productions, but London audiences will be the first to hear the song in English.

Tickets will go on sale on 9 September.