Smash - Recap: Mama drama and after-school specials
Credit: Will Hart/NBC
Recap and review of Smash - Season 2 Episode 9 - The Parents:
The only way for Smash to make it out of this season with its head held high is to steer into the criticisms against it. This means embracing many of its hackier, more soap opera-heavy tendencies. It's what made season one a relatively fun watch, even for those hate-watchers who've deserted the show in its second season. There are plenty of reasons you could list for why this new season of Smash bombed in historic fashion, but some would argue that one of the biggest contributing factors to the catastrophic decline has been the sense that the show has no levity to it. It's no longer a series that had its tongue firmly planted in cheek, embracing its soap opera sensibilities while paying lip service to the idea of being a prestige show with a pedigree behind it that rivals most major motion pictures. No, this Smash had pretensions to grandeur, believing that it could reinvent itself into a respectable genre series. In some cases, the show succeeded. For instance, it's still a handsomely-filmed series with remarkable production design when you consider that these people are costuming/staging three separate shows at once: there's the show itself, and the two shows-within-the-show, Bombshell and Hit List, each with their own distinct visual style. It's a pretty outstanding feat the production team has accomplished, keeping it all together. And the original songs are as good as they've ever been. Seriously. The songwriting has always been the best reason to watch, and I genuinely hope that at least one or two songs survive the series (if nothing else, "Never Give All the Heart" deserves a life beyond the show). But the rest of the show has taken an approach that would have worked in its first season, assuming that Smash wished to present itself as a more incisive look behind-the-scenes at the making of a Broadway show. But it's an approach that doesn't really work for general audiences in its second, not when audiences have been conditioned to expect a more salacious, if not fanatically dramatic, series.
Credit: NBC
This is probably why "The Parent" works so well, as it embraces that soap opera element that makes the show immediately compelling, in an instant-gratification sort of way. Much of the episode details Jimmy's (Jeremy Jordan) problem with his ex-drug dealer. Jimmy got clean over a year ago, but needed money for a fresh start, and made the moronic decision to borrow money for that new start from his dealer. He's now $8,000 in the hole, and the dealer is looking for his payment. It all plays out a bit like an after-school special, as Jimmy contemplates picking the coat pockets of wealthy investors at a fundraiser for Scott's (Jesse L. Martin) theater, a non-profit theater company that needs considerable investments if Hit List is going to happen. Complicating matters for Jimmy is his blossoming relationship with Karen (Katharine McPhee). In his attempts to keep her out of his mess, Jimmy has to keep putting her off, which only serves to make things more awkward. Ultimately, Derek (Jack Davenport) catches Jimmy as he's rifling through the pockets of rich strangers, and, in a remarkable turn for the character, offers to pay Jimmy's debt. It's likely a mercenary choice for Derek, as Jimmy's problem is invariably his own. But it's still a heartening choice to see Derek play the good guy (or, at least, an understanding guy. As he explains to Jimmy, "You don't exactly have a monopoly on youthful indiscretions"). Yet when Jimmy takes the money to his dealer, explaining that he never wants to see the junkie again, the dealer offers him some coke for the road. And like a moron, Jimmy takes it, because he's a "musical genius", meaning he must also be plagued by demons of the powdery white variety. As he walks off into the street, the dealer implies that Jimmy "Collins" isn't even his real name, so I guess there's an even darker past underneath it all. Is it cliche? You bet your ass. But I'm still compulsively intrigued by all things Jimmy, even if the drama is predicated on Jimmy making stupid decisions (mostly because that feels like a completely believable, organic route for the character to take).
Credit: NBC
Karen, meanwhile, has issues of her own beyond Jimmy. While they're awash in the afterglow of the morning after, Karen's father, Roger (Dylan Baker), arrives in town for a work conference, and stops to visit Karen. She hurries Jimmy out the window, though not before Roger catches a fleeting glimpse of a man in a black leather jacket fleeing down the fire escape. Roger is initially understanding and proud of his daughter when he sees her in rehearsals for Hit List, but he sours on the production when he notices Derek wearing a similar jacket as the man he saw leaving Karen's apartment. It's a classic soap opera misunderstanding, as Roger then harbors a grudge against Derek the entire episode for taking advantage of his daughter and convincing her to give up a sure-thing in Bombshell. He says he's read up on Derek and how he treats his actresses, and it's understandable why Roger, as Karen's father, would be a little else than thrilled that his daughter is working with a man whose sexually scandalized reputation precedes him.
Derek is placed in the rare position of playing the gentleman, as he explains to Roger that he has nothing but the utmost respect for his daughter -- and this, after offering him a ticket to the fundraiser to hear Karen sing "Broadway, Here I Come", when Roger had been planning to just leave altogether. However, Roger eventually recognizes his mistake at the fundraiser when he sees Jimmy and puts two-and-two together. He confronts Karen on her decision to leave Bombshell, believing she's made a mistake she's going to regret all over some boy. But Karen insists that she believes in this show, and that it's the right fit for her, far more than Bombshell. Eventually, Roger comes around on the production, and on Jimmy, apologizing to Karen for judging her decisions so harshly. Father and daughter make amends, but not before one last soap opera complication: Roger apologizes to a very understanding Derek, explaining that he'd mistakenly thought he was "together" with Karen. Derek sees Jimmy and puts it together, meaning that the relationship Jimmy advised Karen to keep secret, perhaps knowing how it might complicate things for Derek to find out, is about to come out into the open. Love triangles, man.
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Though these are the more hyped elements of the episode, the actual centerpiece is the drama between Ivy (Megan Hilty) and her mother, the legendary, Tony-winning Leigh Conroy (Bernadette Peters). Ivy is initially too shocked by the revelation that her own mother has been cast as Marilyn's mother to really voice her opinion on the matter. She smiles awkwardly and okays the casting, which Leigh vowed she would not agree to without her daughter's blessing. In her attempts to remain above it all, and keep her emotions at bay, both mother and daughter take a safe, sterile approach to their scenes, which should be meaty and emotional. Tom (Christian Borle) decides to coax a more honest performance out of the women by asking about their pasts during rehearsal, which leads to Leigh telling a bunch of embarrassing stories about Ivy as a little girl. Pushed to the edge, Ivy explodes at her mother and laces into her for her lousy parenting, telling her that she wasn't born with the natural talent of other girls, and that she'd have to work that much harder to be any good. For Leigh, she saw this as good parenting, since Ivy did work harder and grow into an undoubtedly great talent. However, Ivy could never get over how her mother would always, invariably, make everything about herself -- even now, she's hogging the spotlight. Leigh states that Ivy, and the show, needs her, since Bombshell needs a marquee name to sell it. We know from Eileen (Anjelica Huston) that this is true, as she explains that would-be suitor and New York Times Arts editor Richard (Jamey Sheridan) wouldn't be giving Bombshell the front page of the Arts section if not for the return of Leigh Conroy from retirement to star alongside her own daughter.
Credit: NBC
Yet this knowledge doesn't quell Ivy's fire. She tells her mother that while she may need her mother for this show, she'll never need her again once it's over. Ivy then confronts Tom about his decision to cast Leigh, and tells him that although she might understand why he did it, she can't forgive him for it, telling him they can no longer friends. Tom is, instead, simply someone she works for now, and nothing more. This serves as a continuation of Tom's arc, as his decision to be "director" first, "friend" second has already cost him Sam (Leslie Odom, Jr.), and has now cost him an even older friend in Ivy. However, things don't remain as strained as we might expect them to be throughout the episode, as Ivy and Leigh's tense relationship reaches a kind of climax during rehearsal for one of their shared musical numbers, "Hang the Moon". The emotion between mother and daughter is poured out into the scene as the bare-bones rehearsal space transforms into a fully-staged scene, in one of the better implementations of the dreamscape this season. It's a poignant number, though I could have done without the long close-ups on Tom, or seeing people in rehearsal actually crying, as if the show doesn't trust us to get that this is something we should be moved by. Either we feel it or we don't. Telling us to feel it by saying "Hey, look! These people are moved! They're crying real tears and everything!" isn't going to stir that emotion if it isn't already there. That said, the scene itself mostly worked for me, mostly because Bernadette Peters is the kind of transcendent talent that elevates everything around her, and also because she has someone as immensely talented as Megan Hilty to play off of.
Credit: NBC
"The Parents" is a solid episode that brings a soap opera tinge to the storylines this week, whether it's Jimmy and Karen's arcs, Ivy and her mother, Julia (Debra Messing) being asked by Scott to serve as dramaturg for Hit List, or whether it's Eileen being courted by a writer for the New York Times. It's an episode that doesn't sacrifice narrative momentum for dramatic impact, as the stories resonate in the moment while still maintaining a certain level of tension over what will come next. And the music numbers remain terrific, particularly a dazzlingly haunting number for Ana (Krysta Rodriguez) in her new role as The Diva. The song, titled "Reach For Me", is a hybrid of Lady Gaga's piano chops and her theatricality, employing a Cirque du Soleil style staging that makes it among the more visually daring pieces of the series. Hell of a song, to boot. And Scott's push to have more of Ana in the show could either improve the musical or undermine what Jimmy and Kyle (Andy Mientus) are trying to do with the show. It's an interesting potential conflict to introduce at this late stage in the game, and I'm totally on-board with it.
Ultimately, while Smash is moving to Saturdays to finish out the rest of its days, I'd argue there's still a show worth watching here. It might not set the world on fire, but then I don't think it was ever going to. Not in its restructured second season. But that doesn't have to be a bad thing. Not many series get an ending at all, and Smash at least has the opportunity to close its loop. I'll be interested to see whether the show can stick the landing, or if it'll fade out to closing night crickets.