Crashing Pilots: Smash
By Tom Houseman
February 15, 2012
BoxOfficeProphets.com
In an effort to rid myself of this bad habit I am starting a new TV-oriented column, “Crashing Pilots.” Each new series that I review will get two reviews: one will focus on the pilot, while the next will follow-up five episodes in, to see if my opinion of the show has changed. Most shows get better over time (Modern Family and Big Bang Theory), some fall off and lose steam after their pilot (The New Girl and Are You There, Chelsea?) and some show how brilliant they are right off the bat and prove it every episode (I miss you, Community!).
As you can tell by the examples I listed above, I don’t watch much on TV besides sitcoms, but for the inauguration of this column I decided to start with something a little bit different. If there is one thing I love more than TV comedy it’s musical theater, which is why I viewed the commercials for NBC’s new show “Smash” with a mix of intrigue and trepidation. Still, thanks mostly to my trust in creator Theresa Rebeck (who wrote the delightful off-broadway play poking fun at Broadway, The Understudy) I was willing to give it a chance, at least for five episodes.
The pilot, at least, is worth watching, even if some of its flaws are cringe worthy. There are so many opportunities for both comedy and drama in the world of the theater, and it is easy to dip into absurdity and surrealism, as Rebeck’s The Understudy proved. But Rebeck is trying something different here, something more grounded and realistic, which I think is why the show is having trouble finding its footing.
The main plot that the pilot is developing is the rivalry between aspiring stars Karen Cartwright (Katherine McPhee) and Ivy Lynn (Megan Hilty), both of whom are up for the part of Marilyn Monroe in a new musical about her life. We see both of them in their regular lives - Cartwright waiting tables, Lynn in the chorus of a Broadway show, both fruitlessly auditioning - and getting the chance to prove their chops in front of the creative team behind the Marilyn musical. We do not, however, see them directly interact, which is a choice that I like; their relationship can go in a million different directions, and the potential they have is one of the most intriguing aspects of the show.
There’s just one problem: Cartwright is no Marilyn, and the slack-jawed stares that she gets during her audition, when she belts Christina Aguilera’s “You are Beautiful” seem false. In addition to having limited theatrical experience (she doesn’t realize that the criticism “you’re light” is referring to her resume), she doesn’t seem talented enough to star on Broadway. Every time she sings her arms twitch as if she is being controlled by an amateur puppeteer. Her voice is fantastic, but that is not enough for any Broadway producer to take a chance on an unknown by having her star in the musical that they so desperately need to be a hit.
The first episode does not give us enough time to let us get to know Cartwright and Lynn, and we have gleaned little beyond the fact that nobody believes in them (tear drop) or the idea that that Cartwright has little personality and Lynn even less. There is room for both of them to grow, however.
Even more disappointing are the characters that comprise the creative team behind the Marilyn musical. Rebeck does not want to rely on types, which is nice, because clichés of theater folk, both on the creative and business side, abound. But what we get instead are characters that we don’t know at all. Producer Eileen Rand is going through a rough divorce, which is why she is pushing the Marilyn musical so quickly, since she needs a Broadway success to save her career. We know her situation, but nothing about her personality. Hopefully Anjelica Huston will have more opportunities to either be a badass hardass or to diverge from what we expect of a woman with power and money and give us something different.
The creative team is slightly more promising, mostly thanks to Debra Messing. Messing is a great sitcom actress, and it is with great relief that I note that she is able to tone down the energy quite a bit to play writer/lyricist Julia Houston, who got the most screen time in the pilot. Rebeck has said that Houston is her avatar, which is likely why she is by far the most developed character on the show thus far, with Messing doing her justice. Composer Tom Levitt (Christian Borle) and director/choreographer Derek Wills (Jack Davenport) are significantly less developed, as Rebeck is trying so hard to keep them from becoming clichés that she ends up caging them. Levitt has flashes of flamboyance, but overall is steady and kind of boring. Wills is built up by Levitt as a douchebag of epic proportions, but when we meet him he comes off as gruff and silent, and also kind of boring.
There was already a great show about life in the theater, and that was Canada’s “Slings and Arrowness,” which had the kind of outrageous comedy and occasional use of caricature that “Smash” is trying to avoid. But if “Smash” is trying to be both theatrical and grounded in reality, it needs to figure out how to strike a balance better than it has thus far. The dip into dream sequences seem at odds with what the show is trying to do, and the end of the pilot, when Cartwright and Lynn both sing as they prepare for their second audition, led me to wondering how real this scene was supposed to be, or was trying to be.
All that being said, the pilot moved quickly enough that I wasn’t bored, and the charisma of the actors - in particular Messing -was enough to make me not regret signing on to watch four more episodes. The show has lots of potential, and just because it hasn’t capitalized on it yet doesn’t mean it isn’t going to. If Rebeck can better develop the core cast and continue to build without slipping into melodrama (something that Aaron Sorkin couldn’t do in a similarly-tone show biz show, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip), then “Smash” will becoming an entertaining but unspectacular show. There is a lot to build on here, but also a lot of opportunities to take it in the wrong direction, so we’ll have to see which great white way this show can take us down.