00061: SMASH (Broadway Musical Review)

Another visit to NYC and another round of Broadway musicals to enjoy, well, at least that is the hope. The first show to see this week was the musical SMASH, which is based or inspired, or whatever, on the hit TV series with the same name. It is being produced at the Imperial Theatre on 45th Street.

SMASH is a musical about the making of a musical, in this case, the making of “Bombshell: The Marylin Monroe Story.” Unfortunately for “Bombshell,” the music composer and the lyricist, a married couple with a long list of flops, aren’t writing very good songs and/or scenes. Or maybe they are writing very good songs and/or scenes but the director of “Bombshell” and the leading actress in it don’t think the songs and/or scenes are that good. Or maybe everything is good but only the closing number is not good. Or maybe the bad thing is the director who has no guts to do his job, or the leading actress with a diva complex, or the choreographer who is also a great singer and ends up taking over the main role, despite the fact they have an understudy, or maybe the fault lands on the composer and lyricist who are fighting all the time because they are frustrated and one of them is going to therapy and becoming an alcoholic. Or maybe… but their show is “almost there. Almost.” 

Unfortunately for SMASH, it is exactly the mess and frustration found within the making of “Bombshell” that makes this TV series turned musical into an underwhelming experience that still feels as if it was in out-of-town tryouts. To be cleared, I am not comparing the TV series to the musical and I wasn’t expecting the musical to even be like the TV series. These are two different medias and they need to be approached differently.

Within the plot of “Bombshell,” mostly everyone complains about the “speaking scenes” not being funny, and “why are there speaking scenes in a musical when no one expects anyone to talk?,” but ironically though, it is precisely these scenes within “Bombshell” that make the musical SMASH entertaining, not the songs or the dance numbers, either found within “Bombshell” or out of it. 

There were times when I felt that SMASH could had been better as a spoof/satire about the making of a musical. And by this I mean, that instead of an actual musical, it would have been better to create a satire about making a musical because believe me, the only fun part in SMASH as a musical, where the scenes within “Bombshell.” Those “speaking scenes” within the musical were entertaining and laugh out loud funny. But the rest? The musical numbers? The ones within “Bombshell” and the ones in SMASH, they were underwhelming and quickly forgotten.

Like “Bombshell,” SMASH is a real mess, which is also ironic. The song that is supposed to be their big highlight is “Let Me Be Your Star,” but honestly it just doesn’t do much and it is quickly forgotten. What I remember though is the performance of Caroline Bowman as she sings the song “They Just Keep Moving the Line.” That song was a showstopper and the one that should have been the 11 O’Clock number, instead we get Robyn Hurder as Ivy Lynn playing Marilyn Monroe singing ‘I Never Met a Wolf Who Didn’t Love to Howl!” and that song is visually and energetically a flop. 

But just because SMASH is not a good musical–it only received two TONY nominations by the way, it doesn’t mean the actors are not good. They all did a fantastic job, especially Brooks Ashmanskas, as Nigel, the director of “Bombshell,” (Nominated for Best Actor in a Musical) and I truly thought Caroline Bowman deserved a nomination too. Instead, while the choreography wasn’t that spectacular and it felt boring an flat, Joshua Bergasse received the nomination.

Overall, SMAH isn’t a smash and I don’t think it will ever become one either. It had the potential to become a great hit, but like the composer and lyricist in “Bombshell,” the composer and lyricist in SMASH did what they had to do, with what they got. The book, although it had some funny and entertaining scenes within “Bombshell,” wasn’t that strong, and that makes SMASH, a wreck.