Steven Speilberg Is Bringing Hit TV Show “Smash” To Broadway
“Smash” was a NBC TV drama series that only lasted for two seasons, but for those two years that it was on television, it gained a loyal, yet small, fanbase that to this day has been waiting for some sort of revival from the beloved series. “Smash” has been off the air for about seven years now (its last episode premiered in May of 2013), however, it’s looking like fans will be thrilled to learn that their favorite show will be revived, but in a much more lively way.
Steven Spielberg, Robert Greenblatt (the chairman for WarnerMedia Entertainment), and Neil Meron (who produced the Broadway production of “Chicago” recently), all announced that they would be working on a new project titled “Smash, A New Musical,” and the three are looking for it to find its home on the Broadway stage.
Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman are the Tony and Grammy-winning duo who wrote and produced over two dozen songs for the original television series, and they will also be returning to their former “Smash” roles through creating the score for the Broadway production.
The Broadway production is meant to mimic the series in the sense that it will be a stage show that “will follow the efforts to mount ‘Bombshell,’ the Broadway musical-within-a-musical about the life of Marilyn Monroe,” according to Spielberg. However, the creators also want to make sure that the plot deviates from the original series so it’s not overly predictable, especially for those loyal die-hard fans that will surely be lining up down the block the second Broadway is reopened.
The characters of Julia, Tom, Ivy, and Karen (portrayed in the television production by Debra Messing, Christian Borle, Megan Hilty, and Katharine McPhee), will all be in the play production, and will be just as central to its storyline as the television series. Besides those key details, Speilberg and his team are trying to keep other aspects of the play under wraps until the play is actually able to open.
Bob Martin, who helped write the Tony winning music ‘The Prom’, and Rick Elice, known for his writing in “Peter and the Starcatcher”, will be writing the musical’s book itself, and Joshua Bergasse, who has won an Emmy for his work choreographing the “Smash” television show, will also be returning to choreograph the play as well.
“I am personally thrilled to be a part of this musical and its road to Broadway, ’Smash’ is near and dear to my heart, and it seems fitting that a new musical inspired by what we did on the show would eventually come to the stage. I’m beyond thrilled to be working with this incredible creative team and my producing partners, who began the ‘Smash’ journey with me over ten years ago,” said Spielberg, whose original idea led to the NBC series in 2012.
When it was on TV, “Smash” was pretty well-received by critics, however, due to backstage conflicts between the show’s creative team and Theresa Rebeck, the show’s creator, which led to her quitting, the show suffered and lost a majority of its audience. Since then, the series circle of supporters has only gotten larger, as the show has begun to appear on a multitude of streaming services since going off the air.
Obviously, there’s no real timeline as to when this revived “Smash” production will hit the Broadway stage, because there’s no real timeline for when Broadway will reopen in general amid the Covid-19 pandemic. For now, fans can rewatch the series online while we wait.
Eric Mastrota is a Contributing Editor at The National Digest based in New York. A graduate of SUNY New Paltz, he reports on world news, culture, and lifestyle. You can reach him at eric.mastrota@thenationaldigest.com.