Smash Gives 'em That Big Finish

Ivy (Megan Hilty) and Karen (Katherine McPhee) celebrate the fact that they aren't actually competing against Audra McDonald (not pictured) for the Best Actress Tony.

While the Tony Awards are only days away and I have plenty more predictions to make, I wanted to take a break from all that to reflect on a quiet but important event that took place during the holiday weekend: the series finale of Smash.

A behind the scenes look at the making of a Broadway musical, poor Smash has had a rough time of it.  After the pilot premiered to near-universal acclaim and fairly strong ratings, the series began its fast descent into mockery and derision.  The show became the poster child for a movement known as “hate watching,” with people tuning in every week for the express purpose of making fun of the show’s every flaw.  After the rather public firing of creator Theresa Rebeck at the end of season one, NBC promised that new showrunner Joshua Safran would retool the show into a sleeker, sexier Smash and thereby reinvigorate the show.  But the second season premiered to dismal rating that only sunk lower with each passing week, prompting NBC to move it to Saturday nights before officially cancelling the show a couple weeks ago (although any observer could tell the show was doomed for months beforehand).

I have to say, I quite enjoyed the two hour series finale that aired Sunday night.  Although it could have stood an extra 10-15 minutes to fully wrap up its myriad storylines, I felt the finale did an excellent job of providing closure to the series and the characters.  I would have loved to see a higher budget Tony Awards ceremony, and it would have been great fun to see all of the “nominated” industry heavyweights actually cameo, but I loved seeing where all the characters ended up and the wins in each category felt right. 

Ultimately, I feel like Safran made good on most of his promises about fixing the show, as this season was generally tighter, more focused, and less subject to the wild fluctuations in tone and characterization that plagued the back half of the first season.  Not every addition was a home run, but none bombed in the spectacular manner that reviled elements like Ellis or Julia’s son Leo did in season one.  But while I personally am sad to see the show go, I think in some ways this is a blessing in disguise, as the story about the creation of Bombshell came to a natural conclusion with no obvious extension.  Safran has stated that a third season would have seen Karen starring in the movie musical Tom and Julia were asked to write in the finale, possibly with Jimmy taking over composing duties so Tom and/or Derek could direct.  It’s an interesting premise, but even Safran admits he hadn’t quite figured out how Ivy figures into that story, and a Smash without the amazing Megan Hilty is almost destined to be a lesser show.

So why didn’t Smash become the breakout success everyone hoped it would be?  It’s a complicated question.  I think the biggest obstacle the show faced was never fully deciding who its intended audience was.  The show, especially in its first season, would have seemingly knowledgeable characters suddenly become idiots to allow the writers to explain key concepts like workshops and previews to audiences unfamiliar with how Broadway works.  And yet at the same time it would have industry professionals like Jordan Roth or Michael Riedel appear as themselves with no explanation as to who they were or why they were important, something that surely made anyone not intimately familiar with the New York theatre scene feel slightly lost (I’d even wager there’s a large contingent of NYC actors who wouldn’t necessarily recognize theatre czar Jordan Roth on sight).  Trying to have it both ways ended up pleasing no one, as theatre professionals would get insulted by the characters’ spontaneous naivety and outsiders would get confused by the overly specific, unexplained references.

Then there is the problem of the writing, particularly in the first season.  Under Rebeck’s direction the show could be a narrative nightmare, inconsistent in its logic and continually trying to force uninteresting characters down the audience’s throat.  The show also had a nasty habit of making previously sympathetic characters unlikable and selfish, a problem which it never fully escaped.  Add in a 7-month break between seasons and you have plenty of reasons for less dedicated viewers to jump ship.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that theatre people are also partly to blame, as a large percentage of them approached the show with the wrong attitude.  A number of friends and colleagues would constantly complain that the show wasn’t “realistic” and that certain plot twists would never happen, citing that as irrefutable evidence that the show was garbage.  But this assumes popular shows like Law and Order are a 100% accurate representation of the criminal justice system or that Grey’s Anatomy is the place to go for solid medical information.  Like all workplace dramas, Smash embellished elements of the business to make for good TV, and I for one found myself much more disturbed by the things I’m sure do happen, like when Julia’s high-minded Bombshell rewrite was rejected in favor of a more tourist-friendly version.

I think the positives of Smash far outweigh the negatives.  It introduced musical theatre to a wider audience, as even the paltry 2 million viewers a week are more people than see the Broadway production of Wicked in a year.  It provided a host of Broadway actors with a steady, TV-sized paycheck, which will provide them with a nice financial buffer while they search for their next stage project.  And once they land that next project, the exposure they received on Smash will be a valuable marketing tool to help sell tickets (and unlike most Broadway stunt casting, we know these people have the skills to actually succeed onstage).  And it gave us some truly stunning new songs by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, who really need to be writing more musicals to stand alongside Hairspray and the underappreciated Catch Me If You Can. 

So farewell, Smash.  I for one am grateful for the two seasons of entertainment you provided, and while you certainly had your issues, you were far from the unqualified disaster so many folks made you out to be.

The Long Road to Broadway

Review: Smash Season 2 Premiere

Jennifer Hudson and Katherine McPhee prove that once upon time, American Idol actually produced marketable talent.

NBC had a lot riding on Smash, the big, expensive musical drama about the creation of a Marilyn Monroe musical called Bombshell.  After a stellar pilot, the show somewhat undeservedly became one of the most mocked pieces of entertainment in pop culture, resulting in the firing of creator/showrunner Theresa Rebeck and several major cast members.  Following an extended hiatus to accommodate the show’s retooling, Smash has finally returned with a two hour premiere that largely resembles last year’s incarnation, although under the surface lurks a host of subtle but significant tweaks with the potential to radically increase the show’s overall quality.

Season two of Smash picks up right where season one left off, with the cast and creative team of Bombshell eyeing a Broadway transfer after a largely successful run in Boston.  Karen (Katherine McPhee) received glowing reviews for her performance as Marilyn, while critics also singled out director Derek (Jack Davenport) and composer Tom (Christian Borle) for their many contributions.  Unfortunately, the press wasn’t so enamored with Julia’s (Debra Messing) libretto, and the behind the scenes shenanigans that plagued Bombshell’s development now threaten to overshadow the final product.  Meanwhile poor Ivy (Megan Hilty) finds herself struggling to get back in Karen’s good graces after sleeping with the rising star’s boyfriend, a move that has caused the entire creative team to give her the cold shoulder.

One thing new showrunner Joshua Safran has repeatedly promised is that Smash 2.0 would focus more on the backstage drama and less on the character’s soapy personal lives.  The season premiere certainly supports that statement, with all unresolved interpersonal plotlines wrapped up by little more than a wave of the hand before new show-related conflicts are introduced.  While this is a welcomed bit of house cleaning, it eats up a large portion of the premiere’s first hour and makes that episode feel like a repeat of the misguided tonal shifts perpetrated under Rebeck’s guidance last year.  In fact, the first hour is so hamstrung by having to clean up last season’s mess that I’d wager the decision to have a supersized premiere was driven primarily by the network’s desire to trot out the second episode as a better example of what season two has in store.

The new storylines introduced during the premiere are actually quite interesting, and executed with a more consistent tone and pace than we’ve previously seen.  The Rebecca-inspired financial woes Bombshell encounters show promise, and illustrate that Eileen (Anjelica Huston) should really be more suspicious of her bartender boyfriend’s extensive bank account.  Having serial womanizer Derek hit with a succession of sexual harassment lawsuits is a stroke of genius that makes excellent use of the delightfully smarmy Davenport, and the addition of Jennifer Hudson as a Tony-winning actress/inspirational figure for Karen brings with it a welcomed dose of spunk and genuine star wattage.  (As expected, Hudson’s musical numbers are positively thrilling.)

But the storyline with the biggest implications for Smash’s future is the introduction of a competing musical being developed by struggling Brooklyn songwriters Jimmy (Jeremy Jordan) and Kyle (Andy Mientus).  It accomplishes the hat trick of providing a point of contrast by which to judge Bombshell’s progress, creating conflict by offering the possibility of key cast members jumping ship, and making Smash’s world seem more alive by not having Bombshell exist in the vacuum.  Bad-boy Jimmy also makes an intriguing love interest for Karen by virtue of being the only person who doesn’t immediately worship the ground she walks on, although right now the character is so aggressively off-putting it somewhat negates any narrative appeal he provides.

Speaking of Karen, the struggling artist from Iowa has emerged as the show’s most problematic character, a handicap made even more maddening by the fact that she is clearly intended to be Smash’s protagonist.  Her experience in Boston has replaced her wide-eyed naivety with an unearned sense of entitlement, resulting in diva-esque behavior that makes her increasingly hard to root for.  Karen now treats Ivy with the same disdain Ivy exhibited for poor, sweet Karen in season one, but whereas Ivy was eventually scolded and told to tone down her hatred the other characters are inexplicably willing to support Karen’s vindictiveness.  On the plus side, this has allowed Ivy to revert back to the insecure but likably ambitious woman she was in the pilot, becoming a much more compelling character in the process (and her budding friendship with Julia certainly doesn’t hurt matters).

Overall, the first two hours of this season of Smash give us a show that is slowly but surely recovering from the dark days of Bollywood-inspired fantasy numbers that marked season one’s low point.  The show still has its quirks, including an eye-roll inducing transition into a Derek-centric musical number and a couple of highly implausible plot contrivances (Karen is apparently the only actress in New York who still lists her physical address on her resume).  But many of last season’s most glaring problems are conspicuously absent – although I fear dearly departed Ellis may reappear further down the line – and replaced with a slicker, more coherent tale of backstage politics and rival projects.  The show has a vast untapped potential, and hopefully Safran and crew can harness it to create true must-see TV as the season progresses.

Podcast Episode 9: "Smash"-travaganza Season 2

Tonight's the night!  In honor of the highly anticipated return of NBC's musical drama Smash, the podcast discusses the announced changes for the new season and whether they will help or hinder the famously uneven show.  Do a new showrunner, a new musical (the younger, hipper Hit List), and the addition of Jennifer Hudson sound like music to Jared, Jessica, and Spencer's ears?  Find out below.

Podcast Episode 8: "Smash"-travaganza Season 1

Next week marks the much-hyped return of NBC's backstage musical drama, Smash.  In anticipation of this momentous event, Jared, Jessica, and Spencer sit down to discuss the strengths and flaws of the show's first season. Given the multitude of characters and abandoned storylines, there's plenty to discuss, and hopefully they can do it in a way that's more coherent than an awkwardly inserted Bollywood fantasy number. And be sure to tune in early next week for the Season 2 preview

Does NBC Have a "Smash" Hit On Its Hands?

Megan Hilty and cute boys in sparkly baseball uniforms - Just two of Smash's many valuable assets

After months of hype and weeks of Facebook statuses about how much more awesome Smash is going to be than Glee, the NBC musical drama about the creation of a Broadway show finally aired on TV last night.  And I have to say, I enjoyed it.  A lot.  Am I obsessively addicted to it, ready to devour any and all information I can lay my clammy little fanboy hands on?  No.  But I will certainly be tuning in next week to see where things go after a very solid pilot.

First off, I want to say that any comparisons to Glee are apples to oranges comparisons.  Whereas Glee is primarily aimed at young girls with attention spans no longer than a typical YouTube video (and gays who act like said young girls), Smash is aimed squarely at adults.  This goes a long way towards explaining why it is already functioning on a higher level than the Fox series, since most adults won’t put up with the kind of nonsensical shenanigans that occur with alarming frequency at McKinley High.

Thankfully, the characters in Smash are all reasonably coherent, believable people who behave in consistent and mostly logical ways.  I say mostly because it is a tad suspicious that such an on-the-ball personal assistant to a famous Broadway composer wouldn’t realize that sending at an unauthorized copy of a demo recording would be frowned upon.  And even more suspicious is that Katherine McPhee’s character, a 24-year-old who seems well adjusted to New York City and the theatrical scene, would receive a call at 10 o’clock at night telling her to go to the house of the Broadway director she just auditioned for and not figure out he wanted to sleep with her.  But other than that, the characters are well written and serve their functions well.

A large part of this is due to casting, which is spot on.  I particularly enjoyed Debra Messing and Christian Borle as the composing team, and Jack Davenport is deliciously smarmy as the hotshot Broadway director (and I can’t wait to find out why his character and Borle’s hate one another).  Even McPhee, who was probably the biggest question mark as far as acting ability was concerned, is doing a fine job.  Do I want to give her an Emmy?  No, but I also don’t want to yell at her to get off the screen, either. 

I also think the show did an excellent job in handling the biggest concern among theatre lovers prior to the pilot airing.  Most people I know, in typical diva worshipping fashion, seem to be of the opinion that any sane person would cast Megan Hilty on the spot.  I happen to agree that she is probably a more appropriate choice to play Marilyn Monroe, but the pilot of Smash makes a good case for at least seeing what McPhee has to offer in the role.  And honestly, they sold me on the idea of this rivalry with a single line of dialogue: the dismissive “thanks” given to Hilty by the director after her workshop performance of the baseball number.  He clearly doesn’t like Hilty, and honestly, that sort of unfounded bias would be more than enough to hold someone back in this business.

Yet in another way, their rivalry actually is my biggest concern with the series.  If Smash is going to be about the development of a Marilyn Monroe musical, the fictional creative team is going to have to pick their lead relatively early on.  But the pilot sets up the competition between these two actresses as the main conflict for the series, so I’m interested to see what new obstacles they manage to invent while keeping both women in play. 

It also drove me *insane* when I heard that disgusting, Autotune-style mechanical reverb kick in on the FIRST NOTE of McPhee’s rendition of “Beautiful.”  People do not sound like that in real life, and they certainly don’t sound that way when they audition.  If it had kicked in after McPhee went into fantasy-land later in the number, I could have dealt with it, but not right away.  It was the one bad habit from Glee to rear its ugly head, but was thankfully confined to that one performance (Hilty’s vocals sounded gloriously unaltered, which is what happens when you cast actual Broadway talent).

I was also happy to see that unlike Glee, Smash is putting a lot more effort into the “book scenes.”  On the high-school set series, they get so busy singing their pop covers that I often feel like the story is rushed and underdeveloped.  By cutting the number of songs in half, Smash actually had time to begin to develop its large cast of characters and their various problems.  And when the songs did occur, they were for the most part new songs of a very high quality.  And by having the musical at the center of Smash be about a showbiz star, the songs written for the show-within-a-show will be able to reflect the same themes going on in the characters’ lives, which makes them actually work within the context of the TV show.

As Glee continues to be undone by its erratic behavior, the impending graduation of its core characters, and the dramaturgical gymnastic that will be required to keep said characters around for season 4, it’s nice to see Smash come along and take the TV musical into adult territory.  I will certainly be watching, and I hope the rest of America will as well.