Smash: Didn't this show used to be way better?

So Smash, a show about two young women trying to achieve their Broadway dreams amidst all kinds of drama, returned for its new season last night. This show endured a huge overhaul by the show’s producers because viewer response to the first season was less than stellar. Apparently the show was campy with a Capital C to most people, but I liked the first season. 

The original music was fun, beautifully arranged, and encompassed the glamour and magic of old Broadway show tunes. The covers were instantly downloadable and Katharine McPhee and Megan Hilty have AMAZING voices. The acting and plots were an over the top, but it was fun to watch. I liked how there was always a new emotional challenge for the actors. 

According to EW, the producers fired the show’s conceptual creator and show runner and hired the guy from Gossip Girl to replace her. Really? You want to stay away from camp and corniness and you bring in the guy who wrote about Park Avenue princesses and the ridiculously over–the-top “problems” that tragically befall them? But I was still excited to see the premiere. The opening number was FABULOUS. Katherine McpHEE IS SO LUMINOUS as Marilyn in the show’s first number. She’s beautiful and so is the song she sings. It really brought the season off to a great start and promised the glamour and beauty that we all want from the show. That was the high point, but it did not stay there. From there the show immediately delivers the camp that they wanted to avoid, but without the heart that made last season watchable.

 

The script is awful. Everyone’s words are hollow: “On Broadway, everyone will want to bring you down, but if the work is good, they won’t be able to” is said by new addition Jennifer Hudson’s character, Broadway star, Veronica Moore, but as much as the Oscar winner tries to inject her soulful realness into the words, they sound really bland and typical. 

And then later a lunch meeting ends with this sentence being texted to someone: “Let’s move forward with the plan.” Seriously? The show undergoes a million dollar overhaul and the best you can come up with is “Let’s move forward with the plan?” That’s no improvement, it’s a serious downgrade. 

And the worse possible development: the sleazy, slimy, grimy, harass-y director of the Marilyn show, Derek, ends up with Karen, our squeaky queen heroine? I’ve heard of redemption, but that’s ridiculous. That’s like Bambi ending up with the hunter in the end!  

The songs are great though. This new guy, Jimmy (Jeremy Jordan), has an incredible voice. The songs he sings are supposed to be groundbreaking in their originality, but they’re actually pretty basic late 80s affairs. Still stirring emotionally though. He can sing, really beautifully, and he’s cute. He’s a far better option for Karen than greasy Derek. 

And the premiere was two hours? Why? Just to jam pack every plot twist and jump-the-shark moment into two hours? Two hours with all of this drama is just exhausting. Don’t be so desperate Smash!