Viv Hardwick talks to Sir Cameron Mackintosh about how he decided to trust Sunderland's Empire Theatre with Miss Saigon after years of fear about bringing shows to Wearside. The co-creator of some of the world's best-known shows reveals he's keen to bring more musicals to the North-East.

ARGUABLY the world's most successful theatre producer, Sir Cameron Mackintosh freely admits he used to dread bringing shows to Sunderland's Empire Theatre because "years ago it was the one date on the diary you could count on to be disastrous".

Now the newly-revamped building is resplendent enough to take Sir Cameron's even raunchier version of Miss Saigon complete with Vietnam War fleshpots and 3D fantasy.

The man who claims to have no interest in his reported worldly wealth of £400m or so is happy that his ambition of finding suitable big show venues outside the West End is being realised... and hopes that neighbouring Newcastle can match Wearside's stride into the spotlight.

"It's a very happy coincidence for me they have done up the theatre at a time when, much as I would have loved to go to the North-East, I couldn't have put Miss Saigon into Newcastle's Theatre Royal.

"What Newcastle needs now is an 1,800 to 2,000-seater theatre. Previously, the Empire at Sunderland was pretty dowdy and no one would consider going from Newcastle to Sunderland so the catchment was smaller."

The theatre producer takes pride in bringing the Far East to the North-East having come up with the inspired idea of auditioning thousands of Filipino hopefuls to play the Vietnamese roles in Miss Saigon. The result has been fairytale stories like Jon Jon Briones from Manila becoming the world's best performer as The Engineer.

"I'd have been thrilled to have opened the West End with Jon Jon after what has been an amazing journey for him," he comments.

"It's definitely raunchier than it was in 1989, but you know with all of my shows I'm lucky enough to have a team which ensures each production naturally evolves. The juice of it gets richer and richer into a rather good gravy," adds Sir Cameron who has promised "even more tweaking" for Sunderland.

Advance sales are such that he's already looking at other shows from a repertoire which includes My Fair Lady, Oklahoma, Les Miserables and Martin Guerre to bring to the North-East.

In fact Sir Cameron's attention to detail is such that he laughs about this reputation as I bring up the subject of his nickname of Matron.

"I'm called it not so much in the theatre but my friends outside the theatre. I used to be very bossy and make them behave when we went on holiday. And anyway it's perfect that a Matron would put on a nanny in the West End and, of course, I outrank nanny," he jokes in a reference to the fantastic success of Mary Poppins the musical, which took him 25 years to bring to the West End.

"I have absolutely no plans to do anything else. Look, it's almost certain we will be doing other productions of Mary Poppins (around the world) and I'm looking at a couple of my others shows coming to London or touring in the next year.

There's also several other productions opening in other parts of the world, so there's a mass of things to do while renovating my West End theatres as fast as I can... and it will be more than £35m when I'm finished."

But money appears to be mean little to him because he adds: "They only do these spurious financial ratings to sell newspapers, who knows what anybody is worth? What is a house worth until you come to sell it? The four big shows I've had which for decades were pumping out a considerable amount of profits obviously don't do that indefinitely. What's miraculous is that they are running in some shape or form all over the world," says Sir Cameron who dubs it madness to try and compare the world of theatre with other kinds of corporate business.

His Scottish home - 20 miles on foot from civilisation on Loch Nevis - has just survived 140mph winds of the region's deadly gale.

"They've just rung down to say that the sea lashed in on all the other properties but luckily ours has eight foot walls and built of granite so it's fine," he replies. But talk of a major arson attack on the former lodge and a poster campaign against Sir Cameron are dismissed as "media invention".

Has he ever contemplated retirement from showbiz to spend more time in Scotland, the "fantastic home" in Somerset or "the family home" in Malta?

"I don't think I will ever retire, one of the reasons I bought theatres was knowing that when I was old and senile I could still dabble in the theare without having to put on shows."

He also claims that a quote attributed to him back in 2001 that he wasn't going to stage new musicals wasn't entirely accurate.

"That quote was slightly twisted out of context. What I said at that point, and have stuck to it, is that I'm not looking out for the next new musical. But there are certain projects, and Mary Poppins is one of them, which if they came about I'd do them. I didn't say I would never produce again."

In addition to owning seven London theatres and planning to build another (the Sondheim) as a part of a multi-million-pound improvement scheme Sir Cameron was tenacious enough to spend 25 years bringing Mary Poppins the musical to the stage. He and Disney gambled £8m and now have one of the West End's biggest hits on their hands.

But there was a time when the Drury Lane stagehand had £1.50 a week to spend on food in the mid-1960s having spent half his £14 salary on rent. "I was adept at making a little go a long way," he explains and adds: "If I had been born with a silver spoon in my mouth I'd have probably have pawned it."

* Miss Saigon runs at Sunderland's Empire until March 5. Box Office: 0870 602 1130.

Published: 20/01/2005