At Last! Long-Running Broadway Blockbuster Miss Saigon to Get Big Screen Transfer

Hollywood hotshot Paula Wagner, who was a longtime producing partner of Tom Cruise, is bringing the long-running Broadway musical Miss Saigon to the big screen. According to Variety, the film is expected to hit theaters in 2011, directed by Lee Daniels, director of the acclaimed upcoming feature Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire.

An updating of Madame Butterfly set during the Vietnam War, Miss Saigon tells the tragic story of an American GI who falls for a Vietnamese bar girl. With a score by Les Miserables collaborators Claude-Michel Schonberg and Alain Boublil (and additional lyrics by Richard Maltby, Jr.), the musical premiered in London's West End in 1989 and opened on Broadway in 1991, running 4,092 performances before closing in 2001. MIss Saigon won three Tony Awards for original stars Lea Salonga, Jonathan Pryce and Hinton Battle.

The film will be produced by stage producer Cameron Mackintosh and Wagner, under her recently formed Chestnut Ridge Productions company. A screenwriter will be hired shortly for the project.

As previously announced, Wagner also has plans to create a stage musical about hip-hop legends Run-DMC.