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28 March 2024

Original ‘Miss Saigon’ cast member Isay Alvarez has leukemia

'Miss Saigon' star Isay Alvarez and her husband Robert Sena.

Published
By Correspondent

Isay Alvarez, a member of the original cast of ‘Miss Saigon’, has said she has leukemia.
 
She is the second Filipina cast member of the musical set in 1970s Saigon by Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil who is suffering from cancer of the blood.
 
Monique Wilson, the understudy to Lea Salonga’s lead role of Kim in the musical that premiered in London’s Theatre Royal on September 20, 1989, said last November that she was diagnosed with blood cancer.
 
“What I have is a type of blood cancer that is chronic,” said Monique

“I take chemo tablets, four a day. They say it has no cure but if you manage it, then you can extend your life.”
 
The stage-actress and singer Alvarez, who played the role of the bar girl Gigi in ‘Miss Saigon’, told showbiz scribes of her ailment (stage 1 leukemia) on Tuesday while vacationing in Albay, a province in the southeastern part of Luzon Island.
 
She has been taking things easily and calmly, the writers said, enjoying the company of her husband, world-class Filipino tenor Robert Seña, and their only child.
 
Her four-year stint with ‘Miss Saigon’ in Europe, where she regaled audiences with her soulful rendition of the song ‘The Movie in My Mind’, brought her recognition on the international stage.
 
She was one of the 14 Filipinos, including her then-future husband and Salonga, who went to London to be part of the original production of ‘Miss Saigon’, which made and solidified the respective careers of these newbie and veteran thespians.
 
In Salonga, a star was born as she won the Olivier, Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics and Theatre World awards for her role in the musical.