Review: In a makeover of musical comedy, “ Smash ” is up to his name

The great musicals are great mysteries, and not only because they are so rare. They are also mysteries in their functioning. To succeed, they must keep far ahead of the public, like thrillers with twists and turns that you cannot see coming. These are song means instead of murders.

“Smash”, which opened its doors on Thursday at Imperial Theater, is more one that will go, and when the great song comes, it is a killer. But the effect is the same: it is the great musical that no one saw coming.

Or at least I didn’t do it. In 2012, I appreciated the first season of the NBC television series, also entitled “Smash”, on which the musical is based. His pilot, organizing a competition between two modern aspiring actresses to play in Marilyn Monroe in a musical on Broadway, was great. But as the weeks progressed, the story becoming far -fetched and gloppier, the petile has collapsed. Only the songs, by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, and the dances, by Joshua Bergasse, triggered tops.

So I didn’t know what to do The announcement that the equipment was remutched for Broadway Like a comedy instead of a melodrama. A video of “Let Me Be Your Star”, the exciting emotional duo which was the culmination of the pilot, left me disconcerted. Rearranged solo at the start of the new showIt sounded badly: too cool, too light, with a Las Vegas Leer. Did the creative team, led by director Susan Stroman, plan to repair the property by ransacking the few things that the series has obtained?

It turned out to be a brilliant feint.

Broadway’s “smash” being the kind of mystery I mentioned, I will try to pay attention to spoilers. But there is so much to appreciate in the imperial that I could give 10, and there would still be 20. In any case, I do not spoil anything to say that “Smash” remains the story of a monroe musical entitled “Bombshell”. But in this version, actresses are not hopes of intermediate level; Rather Ivy Lynn (Robyn Hunger) is already a star, and Karen Cartwright (Caroline Bowman) his longtime sub-study. They are not in competition – at the beginning.

This changes spectacularly when Ivy reads a book on the method. Do not just play a “sparkling and sparkling” monroe, she insists on giving her character more depth. Even if that’s exactly what the creative team has tried to avoid – a show that wallowed in the Tawdry tragedy – she hires a coach of the actors’ studio, guards of the method of the method. When this strange and prohibited coach arrives, pushing absurd ideas and amphetamines, “bombshell” begins in crater.

And “Smash” is starting to skyrocket.

The book, by Bob Martin and Rick Elice, has already demonstrated a huge competence in the introduction of the characters and the tone. The scenes of the members of the creative team “Bombshell”, in various combinations, are all funny but with distinctive profiles.

The married authors Married Tracy (Krysta Rodriguez) and Jerry (John Behlmann) are affectionately thorny, or vice versa, like a film comedy of the 1950s like “Desk Set”.

And the director, Nigel (Brooks Ashmanskas), as well as his talented assistant, Chloé (Bella Coppola), direct rehearsals so filled with interior theater and gay eggs that you barely notice the story gathering under them. Another thing that you barely notice is the way in which songs and diegetic dances are slipped so carefully, without creaky of the machines. The characters play because they are artists, not because they have unbearable needs to express. The effect, as it suits a comedy, is much lighter.

The arrival of Susan Proctor, the method coach, completely presents a new tone. As Kristine Nielsen represents, resembling Igor in “Young Frankenstein” – the costumes of Alejo Vietti are a piece of laughter in themselves – this succubus of the Black Sea exerts a malignant influence which disturbs the Living, then everyone while sending “Smash” in the comedy orbit.

But in “Smash”, comedy always pushes the intrigue, as the songs are done in conventional musicals. (Here, the songs are illustrations.) Soon, Ivy, now called Marilyn, and making Diva requests of Monroe type, threatens to explode the first performance of the series. WHO’LL-DO-it will happen? The series is built on a similar question, but the answer here is a much better shock. Rabanding the CURTain act, he also creates, as the good musicals must, a reason to raise it for act II.

I will leave the work out of the plot to those who wish to see “Smash” in person and to the presence on the social networks which will spoil him for you. (Influencers and Lescheurs online, or “young vindictive” as Nigel calls them, are part of the story, taking the role of villain formerly assigned to criticism.) What they cannot spoil is the pleasure of Stroman’s staging, making a return to the form of “producers”. It is Nigel who says to the distribution of “bombshell”, “the pace is very important. Crosse the other’s dialogue. Continue to move. ” But I wouldn’t be surprised if Stroman said it first.

Its speed maintains the intrigue at altitude and, yes, covers an occasional slimming, like a comedy comb. The design of the design of the design of Beowulf Boritt moves the locations just as quickly, by Rainstal Studio, where the whole interprets the athletic dances of Bergasse, at the piano bar, where exhausted production meetings but also fiercely caresses collapse in an acrimony powered by alcohol. Ken Billington’s lighting is of a color and intensity that you could call Stroman Bright, and whatever the sound equivalent, Brian Ronan provides him with. You hear everything, but your ears don’t fold.

I was particularly grateful for this restraint during songs: Shaiman’s musical style for “Smash”, recalling the greats of the Monroe era like Jule Styne and Harold Arlen, is better appreciated on a human scale. And the wonderful words of Wittman, written with Shaiman, are so full of word games, sustained metaphor and intelligent cross references that they require more than most to be distinct. The biggest figures on the show – “Let me be your star”, “Baby Grand White de Second Hand” and “They continue to move the line” – are too good and too well sung to miss. And although only one additional song was written for musical, they seem new to smoking arrangements (by Stephen Oremus and Shaiman) and orchestrations (by Doug Besterman) for 18 players.

But then everything in “Smash” is new – and everyone. Nielsen’s hazelnut is a featherweight, and “I hate you, but I hate myself”, Shtick has never been more inventively deployed. Huster, known as a sensational dancer and singer, also makes a beautiful actor, just like Bowman, especially in a scene that I will only describe to say: beware of cupcakes. Even the smallest roles are perfectly engraved, in a case – a very abused dresser – with barely two words to speak.

These are the marks of a production in full alignment, as if it had been to a dramaturgical chiropractor.

While the intrigue addresses its perfect landing, I was again surprised at the turn of events. Not only those of the plot but also those far beyond. “Smash” The Musical is a kind of repair of “Smash” the series, and probably a kind of revenge too. You will not see the credit of the program for Theresa Rebeck, the creator of the series, without a microscope. For some fans, changes may look like a desecration.

For the rest of us, a real musical is a cause of celebration; Most are either too foolish to be musicals or too dull to be comedies. The real mystery of “Smash” is the way in which such a youthful treatment produced such a sterling example of the two.

Smash
At the imperial theater, Manhattan; smashbroadway.com. Walking time: 2 hours 30 minutes.