Crush Week Continues: Smash/Crush

Despite the dip in SMASH's ratings from the premiere, I thought, on the whole, this episode was a step in the right direction. Here's what went wrong and what went right with the show I can't help but have a crush on. 


The Goodish
All of the creative conversations and little moments on the street and in restaurants feel real now. And not just because Jordan Roth shows up (but huzzah for Jordan Roth!) In the pilot, I bought lyricist/composer friendship (obvs Deb Messing knows the Will & Grace schticky dynamic. Ugh, sorry, I just still hate her.) but in that scene, I felt the artistic collaboration. The number of times I've lounged on the couch, around a bulletin board or a piano with Steven, moving numbers around, just freestyling or chewing at the edges of what we're trying to do. 


And my favorite moment of the episode-- hands down-- they're talking about criminal checks on adopting a baby vs. writing a musical. Messing says, "And let me tell you there are a lot of people who should be stopped from writing musicals." And Borle's cackle/laugh/gesture "uhhuhI'm aware." I much prefer Borle as a gay man. 


(PS- my second favorite is when Anjelica Huston tells the twitty girlfriend of her ex, "we've met" and she responds, "I don't think so" and then Huston says all Huston-y "I dooooo!")


Also, I think Julia's right (fine, fine, I looked up her character's name)-- as least based on what we know so far-- that "Let Me Be Your Star" is a better opener than an act break. That song is also growing on me. I still hate the lyrics "Norma Jean's gone/She's moving on" but...what are you gonna do? 


Thanks for showing me some Savannah Wise, Jessica Lee Goldyn, and Katie Webber in this version.  


The Badish
The adoption plot is sort of already boring. Leo's speech? (In the BACKYARD!) I was completely disengaged. I kept thinking... did they recast him from the pilot? Or did his face just get plump? 


And then I kept thinking... BACKYARD!? And then... Brian d'Arcy James is a SCIENCE TEACHER?! 


So, listen. The feminist in me is like, good job, Theresa Rebeck. You don't cop out and make her married to a banker or whatnot. But... the realist in me says, ALL THAT brownstone was bought with musical money? With that backyard and crazy red walls and monstrous industrial sized refrigerator? Just.... 


On the realism front, I also gotta say this. Don't get me wrong; I like Raza Jaffrey as Dev. But as someone with intimate, tedious knowledge of the UK/US Work Visa system, especially with regards to public sector jobs like, say, the Mayor of New York City's office, I find it, well, impossible that he has that job. 


I haven't seen a genuinely Marilyn or Norma Jean moment from Kat McPhee. Even all dressed up, she doesn't look like her, she doesn't feel like her. I like Kat McPhee, and perhaps it's part of the punch they're trying to pull for the moment, but I don't see it. (Speaking, also of WTF on "not seeing it" why does the otherwise plugged in director keep going back to Scarlett Johansson?!? Please don't make me explain why that's wrong.) As far as production numbers go, I think "20th Century Fox" is a much less tired idea than the baseball number. 


The Bottom Line
The original music is improving. But it was Megan Hilty and a song not by Shaiman & Wittman, nor written for the Marilyn musical, that in my o-pinion delivered the most satisfying musical and emotional moment of the show to date. And that was the stripped down version of George Barry Dean, Troy Verges & Carrie Underwood's "Crazy Dreams."


Megan Hilty and Tom Kitt turned a song I never paid much attention to into a very present and applicable baby-tear jerker. I never cared for twang of the original. But Tom Kitt was at the piano for the number, with a nice montage over it. And I'll bet 10 bucks the man Kitt did that arrangement. He can arrange any song into brilliance. (Where was his Tony for American Idiot? No, seriously.) Sometimes less really is more. 


It was a good way to end the ep. because it's a reminder of how many little steps there are along the way. And how big each one feels. Even the reading. Even the workshop. Even if it's probably going to get recast and rewritten. But every day you get up to do it again is a little bit more of a dream continuing to come true.  I liked this episode for the same reason I like the show in general. Because it makes me feel like if I'm not part of something-- you know, really part of something-- that I'll just die. You gotta have that feeling every day. Every day without that feeling is scarier than any prospect of failure.