Smash Preview! An Insider's Guide to the Premiere of NBC's Broadway-Centric Drama
NBC's new musical drama Smash features a boatload of theater actors and is filmed in our favorite part of town: Broadway! Each week, our editors will offer an insiders' guide to the show, including notable cameos, locations and more. Here’s a cheat sheet to the February 6 premiere:
Boop Boop Bee Doo! Annaleigh Ashford dons full Marilyn Monroe drag to audition for the show-within-the show, complete with an over-the-top rendition of "I Wanna Be Loved By You." Tune in to see the creative team's reaction, but in real life, Ashford is a Broadway vet of Legally Blonde and Wicked (as Glinda), as well as the current off-Broadway revival of Rent (as Maureen).
Meet the Parents: Real-life spouses Dylan and Becky Ann Baker play the disapproving Midwestern parents of aspiring actress Karen (Katharine McPhee). They have a much different attitude toward Broadway away from the cameras: Her credits include Good People and Assassins, and he headlined Smash creator Theresa Rebeck’s Mauritius and David Mamet’s November.
Gossip-Monger: Hey, Michael Riedel: How does it feel to be name-checked five times on national TV? The New York Post theater columnist is portrayed as having Oz-like power in scenes centering on a leaked rehearsal video. His actual clout is debatable (Spider-Man, which he savaged, is going strong), but Riedel is undoubtedly tickled to be deemed worthy of being dubbed "a Napoleonic little Nazi" and a "little creep" on the TV show everyone is talking about.
Broadway Divorce Court: A scene that sets up the divorce battle between star producer Eileen Rand (Anjelica Huston) and her husband, Jerry (Michael Cristofer), is Broadway central: Cristofer is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright who has appeared on Broadway in A View from the Bridge; Huston’s lawyer is played by Eisa Davis, who co-starred in Stew’s 2008 musical Passing Strange; Cristofer’s lawyer is played by Robert LuPone, the original Zach in A Chorus Line and now co-artistic director of MCC Theatre.
Office Politics: To establish Anjelica Huston's character as a Broadway power player, the premiere episode went on location in the real-life office of Broadway Across America CEO John Gore, lead producer of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, in the historic Brill Building just north of Times Square. Note the Broadway posters and Tony nomination certificates on the wall, as well as opening night champagne bottles.
Marquee Value: Heaven on Earth, the "hit" musical by the team of Julia Houston (Debra Messing) and Tom Levitt (Tony nominee Christian Borle), is supposedly running at the Shubert Theatre, one of Broadway's crown jewels on 44th Street at the south end of Shubert Alley. The fictional show's marquee and display banners have been superimposed over those of Memphis, the Tony-winning musical now in its third year at the Shubert.
