Here's hoping Megan Hilty doesn't have a complex... For months, NBC has been touting Smash as that new show starring American Idol's Katharine McPhee when in fact she is one of two actresses in the series whose characters are vying to play Marilyn Monroe on Broadway.
"...and introducing Katharine McPhee!" "Watch this specially filmed music video of Katharine McPhee singing 'Beautiful'!" And just take a gander at the poster, nicknamed Mount McPhee by one of the Idol alum's co-stars: It does her co-stars like Debra Messing no favors (is she about to fall off?). Anjelica Huston just barely squeezes in.
So is it safe to assume that McPhee's Karen Cartwright gets to play Marilyn?read more
Resist the urge to pigeonhole or, worse, dismiss NBC's Smash as a "Glee for grownups." It's more original and exciting than that, bringing a thrilling charge of bold creative energy to network TV's mid-season that the fall largely lacked. Smash (premiering tonight at 10/9c, and maybe you caught wind of it during the Super Bowl?) is a musical show-stopper, a lavish and dishy wallow in the glittery yet ...
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Thanks to NBC's relentless marketing and PR campaign, much is already known about Smash, a big-risk series about the making of a Marilyn Monroe musical. At the center of the sudsy backstage drama is American Idol's Katharine McPhee, who stars as an ingénue pitted against a more seasoned Broadway chorus girl to play the iconic blonde.
If the premise sounds hopelessly niche for a broadcast network in desperate need of a hit (thespians! show tunes! jazz hands!), both NBC and critics high on the series have been working hard to change your mind. Advanced word on Smash is that it's the anti-Glee (especially if you've tired of that show's pop song-happy chorus of high schoolers), The West Wing but on Broadway (should you miss Aaron Sorkin's defining sense of a workplace), and a game-changer for NBC (if you went bananas for the first episode, which NBC screened in theaters and made available on-demand and online weeks before Monday's official premiere).
Watch Smash right now — then tell us what you think!
Is it all just hyperbole? read more