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[0:00] Mo Brady: You're listening to Smash'ed from The Ensemblist, the only podcast that shows you Broadway from the inside out. I'm Mo Brady.

[0:13] Aaron Albano: And I'm Aaron Albano.

[0:15] Mo Brady: Faded, not a girl with a hunger for fame, and a face and a name to remember.

[0:29] Aaron Albano: Welcome!

[0:31] Mo Brady: Thanks for having me, Aaron. Aaron is joining me as co-host of this new miniseries where we are going to rewatch and dissect what is still the Broadway community's favorite TV show, Smash.

[0:42] Aaron Albano: Yes, we're talking about the NBC series that aired from 2012 to 2013, and the show gave a behind-the-scenes look at the creation of an imaginary Broadway musical called Bombshell, from the auditions to the workshop to its journey to the Tony Awards.

[0:57] Mo Brady: But we're getting ahead of ourselves, Aaron.

[0:59] Aaron Albano: That's true.

[1:00] Mo Brady: Smash was also an incredible glimpse into the theater community in the early 2010s.

[1:05] Aaron Albano: Yeah, 2010s. That sounds right.

[1:07] Mo Brady: As many of the show's writers, actors, and dancers were played by real Broadway performers with real Broadway cred.

[1:13] Aaron Albano: It was the one show on TV that centered around our industry.

[1:16] Mo Brady: In fact, both Aaron and I were on the show at various points.

[1:20] Aaron Albano: Yes.

[1:21] Mo Brady: Well, I was in a dream sequence. Aaron was in the original cast of Hit List.

[1:24] Aaron Albano: Don't be jealous.

[1:25] Mo Brady: But still, it begs a couple of important questions.

[1:29] Aaron Albano: Why a Smash recap, and why now?

[1:32] Mo Brady: Yeah, actually, I feel like it's more like three questions. Why, why us, and why now?

[1:35] Aaron Albano: Go for it.

[1:39] Mo Brady: As we already said, Smash first aired in what, 2012?

[1:42] Aaron Albano: Correct.

[1:43] Mo Brady: That was seven years ago, and many of the people I work with now, and that you can find in today's Broadway landscape, grew up watching Smash.

[1:51] Aaron Albano: We're essentially a generation away from the Smash generation.

[1:54] Mo Brady: That makes me feel so old.

[1:55] Aaron Albano: I know.

[1:56] Mo Brady: It's horrible.

[1:57] Aaron Albano: Mo and I were both on the show back in the day, but we were both in very different places in our lives.

[2:02] Mo Brady: Probably one of the most fascinating things to me is that our city and industry just went through a very similar energy surrounding Fosse/Verdon as it did with Smash.

[2:10] Aaron Albano: Oh, right.

[2:11] Mo Brady: Yeah, everybody was either on it, or auditioning for it, or opinionatedly talking about it.

[2:15] Aaron Albano: That is true.

[2:16] Mo Brady: Yeah, and I remember the same thing happening with Smash. One of the biggest reasons I wanted to look back on this show, now that we've had, what, seven years of separation from it, is to see if Smash really holds up.

[2:27] Aaron Albano: To see how the show authentically represents or sensationalizes our business.

[2:32] Mo Brady: To see what, if anything, holds true to our 2019 Broadway world, or is it more of a time capsule of the business in 2012.

[2:39] Aaron Albano: And if anything else sticks out that may have or may not have worked.

[2:43] Mo Brady: Awesome. I'm excited to do this. Let's dive in and talk about season one, episode one, which has the incredible name of…

[2:50] Aaron Albano: The Pilot.

[2:58] Mo Brady: Alright, Aaron, give us the stats.

[3:06] Aaron Albano: Okay. The first episode of Smash was aptly named Pilot. The episode premiered on February 6th, 2012. It was written by the show's creator, Theresa Rebeck, and directed by Michael Mayer. The Pilot premiered to an audience of 11.44 million people.

[3:23] Aaron Albano: This episode featured seven songs, three of which were original songs written by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman: Never Give All the Heart, The National Pastime, the baseball number, and the show's anthem, Let Me Be Your Star.

[3:37] Mo Brady: Oh, who could forget it? And what happens in this episode?

[3:41] Aaron Albano: Alright. We fade in on a girl with a hunger for fame, a face, and a name to remember. That face is Katharine McPhee, and that name is Karen Cartwright. She's singing ♪ Musical number: "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" — performed by Katharine McPhee ♪

[3:54] Aaron Albano: A team of writers, Tom Levitt and Julia Houston, are tipped off to a subject for a new musical by their assistant, Ellis. Ellis says, I think Marilyn Monroe would make a good musical. Julia is intrigued by Marilyn as a subject, saying there's just something about her, how much she loved and wanted to be loved.

[4:13] Aaron Albano: So the team gets to work on a demo. Ivy is currently an ensemblist in Tom Levitt's Broadway production called Heaven on Earth. But she confides to him that, you know I love the show, I love you, but the ensemble not so much. She says she just wants a part.

[4:28] Aaron Albano: After three commercial breaks, we finally meet Anjelica Huston as Eileen Rand, who wants the project and wants to connect them with a hot-tempered director named Derek Wills. They all agree to set aside their differences, in part due to a spectacularly staged number on spec called The National Pastime.

[4:47] Aaron Albano: Karen turns a remarkable audition for Marilyn, singing Smash's first pop cover, ♪ Musical number: "Beautiful" — performed by Christina Aguilera ♪ Derek is intrigued enough to invite Karen over to his apartment under the pretense of a private coaching session. But she keeps Derek at arm's length and the episode ends with both Karen and Ivy vying to ♪ Musical number: "Let Me Be Your Star" ♪

[5:07] Mo Brady: Alright, what did you think of the episode?

[5:13] Aaron Albano: I remember loving the pilot, and I feel like a lot of New York did.

[5:17] Mo Brady: Right.

[5:18] Aaron Albano: I mean, the buzz around Smash was so high. It really gave us what we wanted.

[5:22] Mo Brady: Right, I think it's definitely set the stage for what we ended up seeing for the next two seasons. Like, for whatever came afterwards, I think people saw that and they were excited about what was to come.

[5:31] Aaron Albano: Absolutely, because I think it was the most sort of authentic presentation of what our business was.

[5:37] Mo Brady: My first impression was how 2012 this felt. There were so many Troy Bolton hair swoops.

[5:40] Aaron Albano: Oh, for sure.

[5:44] Mo Brady: Absolutely. I didn't realize that it was a period piece, but everyone looked like you wouldn't see people dressing like that.

[5:52] Aaron Albano: Well, my favorite thing about especially like the time, quote-unquote, time period of New York City. Like, did you notice how Eileen ran the exterior shot of her office?

[6:01] Mo Brady: Oh, it's the Brill Building.

[6:02] Aaron Albano: You know, the history of that building, the Brill Building, is that's where songwriters were working out of in the 50s and 60s.

[6:07] Mo Brady: Oh, I never put that together.

[6:08] Aaron Albano: So that was a place that was like very of the arts. And so it does have lore within our community. Now it's a WeWork space.

[6:17] Mo Brady: So that, to me, the Brill Building and Eileen's office was like the first RIP that I saw. And I kept sort of clocking as we were going, like, well, that doesn't exist anymore.

[6:28] Aaron Albano: Also, I cannot pass the subway entrance at 43rd and Broadway without thinking of Smash.

[6:36] Mo Brady: Wait, why so?

[6:37] Aaron Albano: Because Karen comes out of it.

[6:39] Mo Brady: Because she comes out on that one.

[6:40] Aaron Albano: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's like, let me be your star. And maybe they were like showing commercials and stuff. But that definitely, to me, will forever and always be the Smash entrance.

[6:49] Mo Brady: Speaking of Karen, let's get into it because she starts singing Over the Rainbow.

[6:55] Aaron Albano: Right.

[6:56] Mo Brady: I remember watching it again. The differences between Karen and Ivy are wildly more broad than I remember them being.

[7:06] Aaron Albano: Sure.

[7:07] Mo Brady: Does that make sense? From the get, Karen's audition and experience of her audition versus Ivy coming in right after and seeing her the way she approached the room.

[7:17] Aaron Albano: Right.

[7:18] Mo Brady: And then when they both don't get that show, whatever that show was, seeing how they both react to it. You had Karen who was like, okay, whatever. I guess I didn't get it. It didn't go well. She took a call during my audition. I didn't get it. Whatever. Ivy rips up her wig in her Broadway show.

[7:40] Aaron Albano: And I literally was like, oh.

[7:42] Mo Brady: Just in this portrayal alone, you get a very distinct idea of who these two people are.

[7:48] Aaron Albano: Sure.

[7:49] Mo Brady: Who takes a taxi to an audition in a fur coat?

[7:53] Aaron Albano: Oh, right. No one would do that except for maybe someone who was always on and always a little bit extra.

[8:01] Mo Brady: Well, I mean, and especially her conversation with her mother at the end of the episode where she's like, they want me to play Marilyn when she didn't have the job yet.

[8:08] Aaron Albano: Right.

[8:09] Mo Brady: Just automatically jumping to that. I wrote down, Ivy, a cautionary tale of investing in a project that isn't yours yet.

[8:17] Aaron Albano: And I was like, that's Ivy.

[8:19] Mo Brady: Right. And that was sort of the setup that they wanted her to have to contrast her to Karen, who I think in watching again, Karen is absolutely the everywoman for the people who aren't in our business.

[8:32] Aaron Albano: Right.

[8:33] Mo Brady: And she was the one that, for lack of a better term, laymen and laywomen were supposed to latch on to as who they related to.

[8:39] Aaron Albano: Yeah, sure. And Ivy was much more dramatic.

[8:44] Aaron Albano: And yet, watching it the first time, I was like, well, of course you're going to give it to Ivy. Ivy's the professional. Ivy knows what she's doing, right? Versus watching it now, I'm like, Ivy's a bit of a drama. She ripped up her wig! She ripped her wig in the middle of her show. Because she got a call after an initial audition and didn't get the job and ripped up her Broadway wig. I mean, that's literally what stuck with me being like, oh, this is this person. So let's talk about Easter eggs.

[9:15] Mo Brady: Oh, sure, sure, sure, sure. Well, let's talk about that baseball number.

[9:21] Aaron Albano: Oh, yeah. That baseball number, which included Thane Jasperson was in there. I saw Alex Wong, Ricky Tripp, Manny Santos, Chris Might. It was a million people.

[9:33] Mo Brady: Oh, yeah. Justin Prescott, Curtis Holbrook, Spencer Liff.

[9:37] Aaron Albano: Yeah. Right. I think that was also one of the things that excited us as the community was like, oh, that is a really great musical theater number.

[9:45] Mo Brady: Oh, for sure. I want to bring up a section that I'm going to call Albano Fact Check.

[9:49] Aaron Albano: Okay, go.

[9:50] Mo Brady: So let's say that someone came to you, Aaron, and said, we're putting together a number for spec for a possible future Broadway musical. First off, how much time would that take?

[10:04] Aaron Albano: A whole number?

[10:05] Mo Brady: Just do a number like the national pass.

[10:07] Aaron Albano: A number like the national pass time?

[10:09] Mo Brady: Yes.

[10:10] Aaron Albano: Two, three days if it's an eight hour day to put it all together.

[10:14] Mo Brady: How much would you get paid for that?

[10:16] Aaron Albano: In a purely like pre-production place?

[10:18] Mo Brady: Yeah. Like, hey, will you come in? There's no money. There's no show.

[10:22] Aaron Albano: Oh, zero. Maybe like a check from the choreographer like under the table. Yeah. No.

[10:27] Mo Brady: Wait, that happens? People get checks under the table?

[10:29] Aaron Albano: I mean, like a thank you. As sort of like a thanks for doing this. Maybe like a Starbucks gift card. Like if there, if it was like a full, full out, like crazy thing. And if that person has some good money, like maybe like...

[10:43] Mo Brady: And do dancers of that caliber do things like that? Would you have gotten all those dancers to do something on spec for a musical for Hamilton, let's say?

[10:54] Aaron Albano: Well, because here's what's interesting too. Is it the audition for the director choreographer? It probably was. Then I don't know, to be honest, because anytime I've done stuff like that, they've already had the job and they just need to pre-pro a number or that they could present to like the money people, which I guess would be kind of an audition. But what would shock me is if this was the audition for the director choreographer and he was forced to use this girl that the composers wanted him to use.

[11:25] Mo Brady: Oh, sure. They would have used just a dancer.

[11:28] Aaron Albano: Yeah. Or they're like someone that they know.

[11:30] Mo Brady: Right.

[11:30] Aaron Albano: Not this stranger that they were going to put their entire... She was in a Broadway show. She was in Heaven on Earth.

[11:36] Mo Brady: She was in Heaven on Earth.

[11:37] Aaron Albano: At the Schubert Theatre. But apparently she'd never worked with Derek Wills before.

[11:40] Mo Brady: Well, she did do a year in Wicked.

[11:43] Aaron Albano: I want to ask you about Heaven on Earth. Heaven on Earth is the sort of already hit musical. It's already running on Broadway. It's a musical that is written by one half of the creative team that we end up meeting, Tom and Julia.

[11:56] Mo Brady: Tom and Julia. Yeah. Right. What do you think about...

[11:57] Aaron Albano: That has a West End production that he just finished. How do you feel about Tom Levitt and Christian Borel's relationship with Ivy?

[12:05] Mo Brady: It seems... We might be getting into future episodes, but...

[12:08] Aaron Albano: It seems unlikely to me.

[12:10] Mo Brady: Okay. How so?

[12:11] Aaron Albano: I don't know any Broadway compose...

[12:17] Mo Brady: Maybe sort of Lin-Manuel would be something like that. A young person who's written some Broadway shows and has relationships with people.

[12:25] Aaron Albano: Yeah. People like you think about Seth Stewart.

[12:27] Mo Brady: Well, Seth Stewart was a person who was in In the Heights and then became part of the Hamilton family early on. John Rua, the same thing. What I think is rather unlikely is the idea that this composer is coming backstage and hanging out with ensemble members all of the time. And being super concerned when she rips up her wig and he's like, what's wrong? It's like, you just ripped up a wig.

[12:48] Aaron Albano: How much would that wig cost? Do you know how much...

[12:52] Mo Brady: So much.

[12:54] Aaron Albano: Easily guaranteed a five digit wig. Broadway wigs are not cheap. And she just ripped it up. When Savannah Wise says, you're going to be fined for that. I'm like, or fired because you just ripped up a Broadway wig.

[13:10] Mo Brady: I love that you put Broadway wig on this caliber of Broadway wig.

[13:14] Aaron Albano: I mean, it's not a Party City wig.

[13:16] Mo Brady: No, that's true.

[13:18] Aaron Albano: That is lace.

[13:19] Mo Brady: All right. So the last thing I want to ask you is how this episode has weathered. Are there things about the episode that feel very distinctively 2012 or things that you're like, that could happen today on Broadway?

[13:30] Aaron Albano: No, I think it could all happen today. I feel like because, again, the strength of the pilot was that it was just authentic enough. And even watching it now, it felt very, okay, I know that person. Okay, I know these relationships and how they have to balance the excitement of a new show versus a real life thing like adopting a child. These stakes feel very real because our passion for theater is so strong.

[14:02] Mo Brady: Does that even make sense? That conversation with Karen's parents and Dev and Karen at the restaurant. That's a real life conversation that guaranteed has happened to the majority of us. And then in terms of the business, maybe the speed at which Bombshell is getting off the ground is a little quick and a little not realistic. But the idea of momentum carrying a show almost even before it's ready, I think it easily happened now. Almost more so now.

[14:32] Aaron Albano: The one thing that might not. And again, this is what's interesting. Also watching this show post Fosse-Verdon is the hashtag me too scene at the end. Oh, sure. Where Derek calls Karen to come over to his apartment for quote unquote coaching. That's something I remember when I watched it initially, I was like, oh, this is the one thing that could never happen. Now it's the thing that could get him fired.

[14:59] Mo Brady: Yes. I think the pilot does a decent job of letting us in the feeling contemporary, right? They're talking about Michael Riedel. They're talking about Spider-Man and people getting maimed. These are things that we sort of knew about the theater at the time. I think it did. I think it did an excellent job. I think it's interesting that the show was setting up characters that we never really saw come to fruition, right? We never really see Brian Darcy James's arc. We never really see the son. There's a moment where Julia says, I love you both. We're a fantastic family. It's going to be fine. And my first thought was, well, it's not fine for two of you, because two of you are getting written out of season two, right?

[15:36] Aaron Albano: Well, and it's also like, oh, forget about your family, but keep saying we're a fantastic family. Obviously, there's something wrong there. It's interesting that at the beginning, they really wanted us to know about Eileen and her husband, Jerry, or soon to be ex-husband, Jerry. And we were seeing them across the table with lawyers. We're really knowing Julia's husband. We're knowing Julia's son. We're going through this adoption process. And in the end, the show really became about Bombshell.

[16:03] Mo Brady: Yes.

[16:29] Aaron Albano: Well, special thanks to Aaron Albano for joining us for this miniseries. You can learn more about Aaron and how to connect with him online by visiting our website, theensemblelist.com. We'll be back next week with another episode of Smash'ed to discuss episode two, The Callback. Be sure to watch on mbc.com or on the NBC app to keep up to date with us.

[16:49] Mo Brady: All right. And The Ensemblist was produced today by me, Mo Brady. Please help others find out about The Ensemblist by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. You can also download episodes wherever you get your podcasts or at theensemblist.com. You're doing such a good job. And follow us on Instagram to see the latest posts from our website, where we share the stories of talented artists working in Broadway ensembles. Thanks for listening, guys. Until next time, we did it.

[17:14] Aaron Albano: Yay. See you next week.