Goodbye 'Smash'

The Smash Finale: Bye, Bye Ivy and Karen

I was so busy covering the end of the real Broadway season and the real Tony Awards, I kinda lost interest in the fake Broadway of Smash. Then the whole misbegotten series ended with barely a whimper. There the last five or six episodes were, sitting in my DVR for about a month. I couldn't bring myself to watch them until just recently. In a way I didn't want my love-hate relationship with the series to end. But then I saw Andy Mientus, the young actor who played Kyle, on the subway and I knew I needed closure. And so do you, my dozen or so blog-readers. I'll try to recap the horror as quickly as possible. We left off with Episode 211 The Dress Rehearsal:

Episode 212: Opening Night
Bombshell finally opens. Suddenly Tom no longer wants to be a composer, he just wants to direct. But Julia wants to make a musical out of The Great Gatsby with Tom. (It's already an opera and a lousy Baz Luhrman movie so why not?) The entire cast of Hit List is invited to the Bombshell opening night. Of course Eileen would give away that many comp tickets at the last minute. Tom hooks up with Kyle (cradle robber) and Derek sleeps with some dancer who accused him of sexual harassment (foreshadowing trouble ahead).

Smash Episode 206: The Fringe

Hit List or La Boheme?

So if it's the WINTER Fringe and Julia's now-invisible son Leo is almost on his WINTER break, how come everyone is dressed as if it's late summer on Smash this week? Last week we were left hanging as to whether Bombshell was going with the earlier, flashy workshop version which flopped in Boston or the new artsy-craftsy, high-toned, Ragtime-Follies-Scottsboro-Boys-Caroline-or-Change money-losing version. We open back in the rehearsal room and it's obviously the former has been chosen with Derek and Karen driving the "Waaah-mbulance" about not getting their way and Tom, Jerry and Eileen lording it over them. Derek pouts as he stages the big Second Act opener Public Relations and Jerry demands another number be cut to make room for it. He decrees the lovely Lead with the Heart get the axe and Julia storms out. Unfortunately, Jerry happens to be right, the show has too many ballads with Marilyn standing solo and nothing happening.

Smash Episode 204: The Song

Ivy and Karen do some dirty Fosse dancin' 

Jimmy beat Derek in the Biggest Asshat contest on this week's Smash. Julia moved a little closer to Peter's bed--and his home in the Berkshires. Eileen lost control of the show. Kyle soulfully expressed his suppressed passion for Jimmy. Jerry twirled his mustache and Ellis returned, but only on the other end of a phone conversation. The show is still Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, but at least things are getting interesting.

The episode begins with rehearsals for Veronica (Jennifer Hudson)'s big one-night concert which evidently only takes a couple of hours. The talent behind Bombshell are apparently the only people on all of Broadway available to put this slapdash thing together. Of course both Ivy and Karen are in the chorus and Derek perversely has them fondle each other in a blatant rip-off of the Air-Erotica number from All That Jazz. The Fosse references are flying fast and furious later on as Veronica is forced to perform the ultimate uptune I Got Love as though it were Steam Heat with a bunch of hip thrusts and flared wrists. Veronica's momager (Sheryl Lee Ralph in a weird bit of casting--the Broadway Deena from Dreamgirls playing the mother of the movie Effie) demands that Derek keep her little girl's pure image in tact and drops a further foreshadowing hint that Tom would make a great director. Ivy said the same thing last week. Will this mean Tom will threaten Derek's position as the stager of Bombshell? Plus the mom has arranged for Bravo to tape the concert and NBC's sister network and its logo are shown and mentioned a million times.

Smash: Episode 203: The Dramaturg

Ain't nothing sexier than a dramaturg, baby!

How's that for a sexy grabber of a title? The Dramaturg? You must be kidding, Smash! No wonder the ratings are continuing to slip. But then in the Smash universe, dramaturgs aren't bookish, nerdy types, but fabulously wealthy, devastatingly handsome, beefy studs like Daniel Sunjata. Even their libraries are carefully arranged stacks of books piled in artful arrangements in spacious Manhattan lofts. oh, and they dine in these lovely little restaurants with suitably chic-looking companions. This character is stuck into the plot in order to whip Julia's turgid Bombshell book into space. Julia resents him right off the bat which means she'll probably be sleeping with by the next episode.

Smash Is Back and Just as Cuckoo as Ever

Now that Smash has come back for a second season--which in itself is a miracle--I really hate Karen or maybe it's just that Katharine McPhee continues to be such a vapid bore in the role. In real life, she would the understudy for Marilyn in Bombshell and the more vibrant, gutsy Ivy (Megan Hilty) would be the star. This imbalance kinda throws off the whole premise of the series. The two-hour premiere begins with a new number "Moving On," depicting Marilyn moving on to another stage in her life and the show closing in Boston. Evidently Ivy survived her drug overdose during the second preview and didn't even go to the hospital (this is all covered during the opening montage.) Everybody gets back to New York and Eileen announces there will be a big press event at the Players Club.