Smash'ed Broadway Podcast Network

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Smash’s series finale “The Tonys” premiered on May 26th, 2013. It was the second part of a two-part series finale event that night. The finale was written by season 2 showrunner Joshua Safran, and directed by Michael Morris, who directed the previous episode as well (again, two-parter). And surprise, surprise, the viewership stayed the same from the previous episode (which was an hour ago) which came in at a steady 2.44 million viewers.

Our finale’s set list was comprised of three songs: one cover and two originals. Our cover featured the majority of our principal cast singing “Under Pressure” by Queen. For our originals we were treated to a very Pitch-Perfect-esque Tony Performance of the Hit List staple “Broadway Here I Come,” written by Joe Iconis and performed by the full Hit List Cast (sans Mara Davi), and as our finale ultimo, in-house team Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman took the series home with their original song “Big Finish” sung by our leading-lady duo, Megan Hilty and Katharine McPhee.

After two seasons, the companies of Bombshell and Hit List are both “Under Pressure” as they march toward the Marquis Theatre - home of this year’s Tony Award ceremony. With only 12 hours until the big show, Tom and Julia are writing their possible acceptance speech, Derek is drinking to forget that he publicly admitted casting Daisy in exchange for sex, and Leigh and Ivy discuss how the other one has better chances of winning.

Jimmy is sabotaging himself by attempting to get out of attending the ceremony, until Julia has a “Come to Jesus” with him to get the balls to attend. Also, Derek is sabotaging himself by attempting to get out of attending the ceremony, until Ivy has a “Come to Jesus” with him to get the balls to attend. But both end up attending, which is good because they both end up accepting awards: Derek for choreographing Hit List and Jimmy on behalf of Kyle of Hit List’s book.

Gabe and Lexi are furious that they’ve been called in to perform at the Tony Awards to support Daisy, until Ivy reminds Karen and company that they can refuse to perform with her. When they do, producer Jerry counters by giving Daisy the chance to perform “Reach for Me” instead. But following her win for Best Featured Actor, Derek decides to make it right and take Daisy out of the Tony performance, putting in Karen, Jimmy and (surprise) Ana in an a cappella performance of “Broadway, Here I Come.”

After winning for Best Score, newly minted Tony winners Tom and Julia decide to stay together as a writing team. Ivy gives a touching ode to live theatre in her acceptance speech for Best Actress and while Hit List walks away with most of the initial awards, Eileen Rand’s Bombshell takes home the prize for Best Musical.

In its closing moments, the cast of Smash couples up - Ivy with Derek, Julia with Michael Swift, Eileen with her formerly imprisoned bartender, Karen with a prison-bound Jimmy- and the series finale ends with as much of a non-sequitur as it began: an out-of-time duet performance by our two divas giving the show a “Big Finish.”
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The penultimate episode of season 2, “The Nominations,” premiered on May 26th, 2013. It was written by Bryan Goluboff, who last penned “The Dramaturg” earlier this season, and was directed by Michael Morris, who has written a number of season 2 episodes. The viewership jumped up by .43 million viewers from the last episode, bringing the total viewership to 2.44 million.
We had three featured songs this week, with our only original song being an excerpt of Hit List’s “Rewrite This Story” written by Pasek & Paul. Our two others included a cover of Traffic’s “Feelin’ Alright” sung by Megan Hilty, and “If You Want Me” from Once, performed by Krysta Rodriguez.
It’s just days until Tony Award nominations come out, and nobody’s feeling alright: Eileen wants more nominations than Hit List, Tom wants a win to cement his future as a director. Oh, and Ivy Lynn is puking in the bathroom between scenes because she’s pregnant. Jimmy is worried that Kyle won’t be recognized with a Tony nomination for Best Book, but Hit List’s producer Jerry says he’s worried about the wrong thing: Ana is filing a wrongful termination suit against Derek.
The Outer Critics Circle deems “Best Director” a tie between Derek and Tom, and Julia Huston wins “Best Book” for Bomshell. But Hit List walks away with the rest, including acting awards for Karen, Sam and Daisy. The win for Daisy lights a fire under Karen’s ass to protect her roommate, igniting her to storm into Daisy’s dressing room demanding she quit Hit List. But Daisy’s been working too hard for ten years to give up this opportunity.
At the Outer Critics Circle luncheon, Julia gives a touching tribute to Kyle, and Tom dedicates his joint win to Derek, but afterwards tensions fire as Jimmy interrupts the proceedings to give Julia a lecture in theatrical ethics. Burning the candle at both ends and with his voice failing, Karen encourages Jimmy to call out of that night’s show and watch the fruits of Kyle’s labor from the audience. Teary-eyed after sitting in the Barrymore, Jimmy realizes that theatre lovers will remember Kyle for his work onstage, not because he did or didn’t win a Tony.
The morning of the nominations are announced, everyone from the Bombshell and Hit List camps are crowded around their screens to watch them live. Bombshell gets 12 nominations, including those for Ivy, Leigh, Derek, Julia, Tom but Hit List gets 13 with nods for Karen, Daisy, Derek, Jimmy and Kyle. But all is not peachy, as Julia being dragged to court by her soon-to-be-ex-husband and Derek publicly acknowledges that he wrongly terminated Ana and gave the part to Daisy after sleeping with her.
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“The Transfer” premiered on May 11, 2013. It was written by Justin Brenneman and Julia Brownell; Brenneman is a Smash rookie, while Brownell last penned last month’s episode, “The Dress Rehearsal.” The episode was directed by Holly Dale, also a newcomer to our Smash world. The viewership fell for its last time in the series, dipping by 270,000 to a total of 2.01 million viewers. 
We had four original songs in the episode this week. Our two from Hit List included “Pretender,” written by Lucie Silvas and Michael Busbee, and “I’m Not Sorry,” written by Andrew McMahon. Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman penned our remaining two for the Houston/Levitt revue, which were the punny “Grin and Bare It,” performed by Megan Hilty, and “The Right Regrets,” sung by our now-defunct music team Christian Borle and Debra Messing.
Audiences are literally running to see Hit List on Broadway with Derek’s former assault-ee Daisy now understudying Ana but something about the show isn’t working uptown. Derek is worried that the problem is Ana’s performance as the Diva, so he tries putting Daisy on for the role. Jimmy wants a posthumous Tony Award for Kyle, so he and Julia get to work on finding a solution that brings some of the downtown magic Hit List had off-Broadway up to 46th Street.
The great Lindsay Mendez guest stars as the great Lindsay Mendez performing in a one-night concert of Huston and Levitt songs designed as a ploy for Tony nominations. You see, as Eileen knows “the Tonys are not just about a great show, but a great story.” And Bombshell’s story is that Tom and Julia are a great, yet so-far unawarded pair of song writers so she asks the semi-estranged duo to perform a duet at the concert.
Ivy and Karen make a Times Square promise that although award season is bound to get a little crazy, they promise to be adults about it. Ivy’s pill-popping past is catching up with her, so she has to start fixing her reputation from difficult diva to sweethearted star. But the player with more on the line is Derek, who is being blackmailed by a “Not Sorry” Daisy in exchange for taking over Ana’s role. 
Everyone who’s anyone shows up for the Huston-Levitt concert, including pre-icon Lin-Manuel Miranda playing a twitter-obsessed, Jonathan Groff-obsessed Lin-Manuel Miranda. That is, everyone except for Julia who is too busy reworking Kyle’s ideas into ways to save Hit List. Covering for Julia missing in action, Ivy throws caution to wind and doubles down on her bawdy reputation in a burlesque performance of “Grin and Bare It.” And in the 11th hour, Julia finally arrives to perform a nostalgic duet with Tom as they both decide to say goodbye to their writing partnership.
When Ivy is confronted by Ana about Derek, the leading lady takes on Karen saying”you play this naive, just-off-the-bus routine to get exactly what you want, but deep down you’re just as calculating as the next person.” In a parting shot, Ivy tells Karen that she’s glad Hit List made it to Broadway because now she can beat her fair and square for the awards. Also, she's pregnant.
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“The Phenomenon” premiered on May 4th, 2013. It was written by Jordon Nardino, who last wrote episode 9 of this season “The Parents,” and season two showrunner Joshua Safran, who last wrote the premiere of this season “On Broadway.” Star Trek fans rejoice, the episode was directed by B'Elanna Torres herself, Roxann Dawson, who last directed episode 13 of season 1, “Tech.” “The Phenomenon” experienced the second-highest jump in ratings in the entire series, second only to a jump early in season 1; this week’s viewership hit a total of 2.28 million viewers, up by .39 mil from the previous week.

This week’s episode included five featured songs: two covers and three originals. The covers included Radiohead’s “High and Dry” performed by Jeremy Jordan, and Billy Joel’s “Vienna” serenaded by Christian Borle. We again heard an excerpt of Iconis’ “Broadway Here I Come” but the two full-length originals came from Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman: Bombshell’s “At Your Feet” and Hit List’s “The Love I Meant to Say.”

Sam Strickland’s put in rehearsal to replace Jimmy is in three hours, but Karen and Derek are screwing around on the couch - that is until Jimmy breaks onto Karen’s fire escape, catches the two in her apartment and runs off. Tom gets a call from his former one-night stand Kyle’s phone, but instead of a booty call it's the police letting him know that Kyle was killed in a car accident. 

Eileen Rand is ready to talk about a Tony campaign, and Bombshell is the show to beat. Ivy Lynn may be nominated twice: as Best Actress in Bombshell and Best Supporting Actress in Liaisons. But all that Tony talk is put on hold when the Bombshell company learns about Kyle’s death, with even Ivy calling in sick to be with Derek down at Manhattan Theatre Workshop.

In a series of flashbacks, Kyle’s friends remember their own favorite intimate moments with him: Julia in storyboarding Hit List, Tom in a boudoir serenade, Karen in an lobby chat during Bombshell’s opening, and Jimmy in brainstorming Hit List ideas along the East River. Finally with a justifiable reason to be sad, Jimmy uses a song from the show to memorialize “the love he meant to say” to his dear departed best friend.

With Gabe and the company of Hit List understandably shocked, Derek cancels the evening performance. But the Hit List fans show up anyway to honor Kyle’s memory, and a seated reading at music stands for a standing room only house turns Hit List into a phenomenon destined to move uptown to Broadway (funded by Eileen’s ex-husband, Jerry.) And as a parting gift, Julia gets the lights of the Lily Hayes theatre marquee dimmed in Kyle’s honor.
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“The Producers” premiered on April 27, 2013. It was written by Becky Mode, whose last episode of Smash was season 2 episode 7, Musical Chairs, and was directed by Tricia Brock, whose last episode was season 2 episode 9, The Parents. The viewership dropped again by 20,000 viewers, to a total of 1.89 million.
We had a lot of music this episode, mainly from Hit List! Our one song from Bombshell was an excerpt of Shaiman and Whitman’s “20th Century Fox Mambo” performed by Megan Hilty (and Kathie Lee Gifford?), and our one cover was Jeff Buckley’s “The Last Goodbye,” sung by Andy Mientus. The remainder of our songs come from Hit List: we hear excerpts from Pasek and Paul’s “Rewrite this Story,” and Joe Iconis’ “Broadway Here I Come.” Two new songs were another by Joe Iconis called “The Goodbye Song,” and “Don’t Let Me Know,” written by Lucie Silvas and Jamie Alexander Hartman.
Without much competition for new musicals on Broadway this season, Bombshell is poised to make a splash at the Tony Awards in June. But with slow ticket sales, Eileen is going to have to pray for a miracle to keep Bombshell open til June. So she is whoring out Ivy for press events right and left, anything from the Today show to an appearance at the Brighton Beach Senior Center. 
Adding insult to injury, producers Daryl Roth and Kevin McCollum are duking it out with ten other producers ready to write a check to move Hit List to Broadway this season. But there may not be a show to move if Jimmy shows up late and high for photo calls. Derek attempts to solve the Jimmy problem by hiring former Bombshell ensemblist Sam Strickland to understudy him. 
Things are looking up for Julia, with the announcement her new non-musical version of Gatsby going to Manhattan Theatre Workshop next season. Now that Tom isn’t in line to direct the City of Angels revival, he wants Julia to create the show with him. The conflict comes to a head at one of Ivy’s many press events: Julia feels Tom told her under no uncertain terms he only wants to direct, while Tom believes Julia is only interested in being a writing partner when she gets her way.
With tonight seeming to become the most important night in Hit List’s life, Derek gives Jimmy an ultimatum: shape up or ship out. But Jimmy doesn’t take the threat seriously, showing up late onstage, making up choreography and causing an onstage accident that leaves Karen with a bleeding gash. The performance is the last straw for Derek, firing Jimmy on the spot. But the journey for Hit List may be dead in the water anyway, as every potential investor is scared off because the show isn’t financially viable enough to make it on Broadway.
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