Smash

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Katharine McPhee and Megan Hilty as duelling Marilyns in Smash
With only two episodes aired, it’s difficult tosay where exactly Smash, the new NBCseries about backstage Broadway lives, will take us.  Executive produced and so far written byplaywright Theresa Rebeck, the show responds to Fox’s Glee by embedding lavish musical numbers in its story of alyricist-songwriting team creating a Broadway show about Marilyn Monroe.  The plot line so far addresses the intriguethat surrounds producing, casting, and directing such a behemoth.
Of course, the whole thing is an elaboratefantasy.  First, Angelica Huston (whoseonce expressive face is now, sadly, barely mobile) plays Eileen, the soleproducer of the new musical.  In reality,Broadway shows are littered with people whose financial investments, if nothingelse, give them above-the-title producing credit.
Second, Rebeck’s script for Smash has streamlined the process so that in just two episodes, thedynamic music-and-lyrics duo Julia (Debra Messing) and Tom (Christian Borle) havemoved from the glimmer of an idea into staffing and casting the show.  In real life, a project like this would beworkshopped for years and involve a zillion people before it arrived at thepoint where Smash picks up.
Christian Borle and Debra Messing as the musical's authors, Tom and Julia
But here, by the second episode, Eileen has encouragedthe director, Derek (written as a sexy sleaze and played by the British actorJack Davenport, late of FlashForward),to do a quick workshop production and then get the show on Broadway’sboards.  Would that it were all so easy!
The musical’s partners are played with verve andsomehow, believability, by Messing (cast as Rebeck’s doppelganger) and Borle(who last season played a superb Prior in Angelsin America at the Signature Theatre Off Broadway).  So far, Borle has little to do as Tom butbasically play out-and-proud gay.  Heflirts with his impossibly cute but untrustworthy assistant, Ellis (JaimeCepero), and lobbies for his friend, Ivy Lynn (Megan Hilty), to get the lead inhis show.
The show’s conflict comes from the competition itmanufactures between its would-be Marilyns, two talented young women with verydifferent looks and takes on the iconic star. Hilty (Wicked and 9 to 5), a bona fide Broadway performerboth in actuality and in character as Ivy, represents the body-type.  She’s blond, buxom, and can belt with thebest of them.
Hilty as Ivy, the Broadway veteran
Former AmericanIdol star Katharine McPhee plays Karen Cartwright, an untested young womanfrom Iowa (of course), whose brown hair and slight build make her lessrecognizable, at first, as the curvy, breathless 50s personality who seducedJoe DiMaggio, Arthur Miller, and President Kennedy.  But in the show’s intercut fantasy sequences,dolled up in the right costume, wig, and make-up, Karen passes for Marilyn verywell indeed.
McPhee as Karen, the Midwestern novice
The first two episodes have careened along on thesuspense of who Derek would cast as the musical’s lead.  He summons both young women for privatemeetings, calling Karen late at night and requiring that she come to his (mouthwateringlylavish) apartment for a private audition. In the first episode’s most unlikely scenario, she goes, and somehowmaintains the upper-hand in a situation clearly constructed for sex.
Derek tells her he needs to “see everything,” andshe changes in his bathroom into a large, white, man’s shirt, then performs theequivalent of a private lap dance and signature Monroe-style song.  At its end, she tells Derek that’s all he’sgetting, and leaves his apartment unscathed (though it’s unclear whether herespects her for her fortitude or loathes her. He must ultimately respect her, because he calls her back and lets hercontinue the audition in public).
Karen lap-dancing for Derek at his apartment
Hilty’s character, Ivy, is less reticent whenDerek makes his moves.  They’re workingalone in a rehearsal hall when he asks if he can let down her hair (literally)and then frames her blond locks around her face meaningfully.  The next scene shows them rollicking naked inbed together.
All this reaffirms the stereotype of the Broadway(and Hollywood) casting couch, the mythic place where powerful men have sexwith desirable and desiring young women to authorize and launch their careers.  Because Karen has a boyfriend, Dev (RazaJaffrey, who plays a functionary at the mayor’s office), and because she’srejected Derek’s advances, she’s portrayed as the ethical, fresh-faced,unspoiled young thing from the flyover states.
Ivy, on the other hand, is already performing in aBroadway show.  Her friends are gypsies,the corps of performers who sing and dance in musicals and make their living asunknown but employed and talented company members.  Many of the men are gay, and in Smash, that stereotype holds fast.  One of Ivy’s friends is hired to dance in theMarilyn musical’s rehearsals, and passes information on to Ivy about Karen, hercompetitor.  Since Ivy is already part ofBroadway culture, she’s portrayed as wiser to the ways of the world and morewilling to play what Rebeck describes as the professional theatre’s necessary games.
Subplots abound here, all meant to humanize Julia,the Messing character, who is the show’s lead. Julia and her husband, Frank (Brian d’Arcy James), live in a comfortablebrownstone with a huge kitchen, huge bedrooms, and a huge patio or porch offits dining room, its real estate representing another of the show’s fantasy aspects. He stays home to supervise the householdand their teen-aged son.  Julia is thefamily breadwinner, although in the pilot, she’s supposed to be taking a breakfrom her professional work to concentrate on her family’s child adoptionprocess.
Frank’s disappointment in her decision to developyet another musical instead of being available for the social workers and otherbureaucrats who fill the U.S.-China adoption pipeline establishes another plotconflict that will no doubt play out this season.  Julia balances on the precarious edge betweenbeing a good artist and a good wife/mother and Smash tries not to judge her for putting her work first.
But by the second episode, the balance shifts, as Juliareveals her deep emotional commitment to the adoption and Frank wavers,admitting he wants to go back to work as a science teacher and that he’s afraidhe’s too old for a new baby.  Watchinghow this dilemma plays out along or against typical gender expectations shouldbe interesting.
Smash isfun television, and the musical numbers, which so far represent more of a teasethan the series’ meat, are energetically choreographed and beautifullyperformed.  Smash has an impressive pedigree; it’s produced by Steven Spielbergin conjunction with a number of Broadway notables, directed by the verytalented Michael Mayer, and cast with some of the best actors in New York. 
Rebeck, the series’ show-runner, is one of the fewsuccessful women playwrights who, like Wendy Wasserstein before her, can open aplay directly on Broadway.  Her mostrecent hit, Seminar, which stars AlanRickman (though Jeff Goldblum has just been announced as his replacement) andLily Rabe, is a funny, smart play about a creative writing workshop lead by apreemptory, haughty snob.  Rebeck’s earfor dialogue and witty repartee and her talent for slick plotting isunparalleled in the contemporary American theatre.
And Rebeck’s commitment to women playwrights iswell-established.  Her keynote for the 2010Laura Pels Awards excoriated powerful theatre producers and critics for theirgender bias and demanded action.  She’sbeen an outspoken, visible, and powerful advocate.
Sometimes, though, Smash tells stories in which its women are maligned without necessarily critiquing how they’re forced tocompromise.  The first two episodes turn on the caricature of themean-spirited but talented, wicked but sexy straight male director who testshis female stars in the sack as well as on the stage.  The story line forces Karen and Ivy to competefor his attention sexually as well as professionally.  That might be how Broadway business isconducted, but if Smash is a fantasyanyway, why not imagine a different kind of theatre world?
I’ve only seen two episodes so it could beentirely too soon to tell where the story of Smash will take its characters and its audience.  It’s fun to watch a television show that’sactually about theatre, instead of one like Gleein which the musical numbers are justified by the high school clubsetting.  And it’s fun to see the gay subcultureof Broadway represented so nonchalantly. 
The song-and-dance numbers (choreographed byJoshua Bergasse) so far are energetically performed and filmed with high styleand verve.  And it’s wonderful to seeRebeck’s name splashed across the credits so prominently.
I’ll stick with Smash, because it’s significant and important that Rebeck is awoman carrying a high profile, big-budget series.  And I’ll keep believing that the womencharacters will get more complicated and the show’s story lines morenuanced.  Then the show really will be asmash.
The Feminist Spectator