How To Save Smash

Everyone in the theater knows that Broadway producers typically lead long development processes (Trey Parker and Matt Stone started working on The Book of Mormon in 2004), lean heavily on star casting (Ricky Martin in Evita; Chris Rock in The Motherfucker With the Hat), and prefer name-brand adaptations (Ghost: The Musical?) over new productions. In Smash, by contrast, producer Eileen Rand (Anjelica Huston) aims to stage a new Broadway bio-musical put together quickly and with no marketable actors. When someone suggests casting Scarlett Johansson as the lead, these words actually come out of a Broadway producer?s mouth: ?Get it out of your head. We are not chasing stars.? Maybe Smash is Broadway?s West Wing: Just as liberals pined for President Bartlet, serious theatergoers dream of this kind of Broadway producer. The real-life people who bankroll productions understand that Daniel Radcliffe sells tickets.

But Huston?s Rand is a romantic. One of the few insults from her soon-to-be-ex-husband that doesn?t make her throw a drink in his face comes when he accuses her of believing that Broadway theater is?gasp!?art. In this week?s episode, Rand, who is financially strapped, turns down her husband?s offer to secure money from a potential investor, played by real-life producer Manny Azenberg. Rand could use the money to fund her musical, but producing the show herself, on her on terms, matters more to her.

Such principled stands have set Smash up to being one of the least cynical portraits of theater producing on record. Think of Max Bialystock courting little old ladies to raise funds in The Producers. Or Max Fabian from All About Eve, who says of his star, ?She loves me like a father. Also, she?s loaded.?

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