Recapping Smash 2.1: 'I'm Your Muse. It's What We Do.' | Playbill

Related Articles
Film & TV Features Recapping Smash 2.1: 'I'm Your Muse. It's What We Do.' With the Season 2 premiere, Smash cleans narrative house and brings in some new faces while Karen and Ivy remain locked in perpetual battle.

In the words of the Season 2, Episode 1 opening number: Cut, print, moving on from... Ivy Lynn's pills; Dev; Michael Swift; Eileen throwing drinks in faces; and Sam (who gets The Book of Mormon tour).

And honestly, what delicious snark to open a new season with the lines, "I know I've lept you waiting, I know I've made you made..." Is that Marilyn or Smash singing directly to us?

Things we're not moving on from: Everyone obsessing over Karen's talent; Ivy Lynn behaving badly and throwing her arms up in the air as to why people keep her at arms length; Julia being wildly unprofessional (she doesn't read reviews, just Tom's face—that tells her everything she needs to know); adding songs to an already jam-packed show (seriously, at what point does "Cut Print Moving On" enter Bombshell; Jerry showing up like a jack-in-the-box and throwing a wrench into Eileen's plans. And as usual, Eileen sidesteps him and books the St. James with a little help from its owner, Jordan Roth! (Note: Eileen has switched from martinis to Gibsons.)

Just to keep songwriters Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman busy, they write a song for another fake musical, Beautiful. (No, not the one you think.) Veronica Moore (Jennifer Hudson) stars, but she's leaving shortly to do a The Wiz revival with Derek, Quick reminder that Dorothy is a teenager in The Wiz. She tells Karen to "protect the work."

After blowing off Ivy, Karen tries to blow off Jeremy Jordan—sorry, Jimmy—which is honestly not very Midwestern of her. She's shown up to ask Derek (who's meeting with Michael Riedel) that she doesn't want Ivy Lynn breathing down her neck. Derek shrugs and says, "Consider it done."

Oh Derek, buckle up: Rebecca Duvall releases a statement saying that she left Bombshell because Derek sexually harrassed her in her dressing room. And so begins the dominos tumbling down, because Jordan Roth cancels and now Eileen isn't sure if she has the St. James or not. But Veronica Moore and Karen save the day, singing "On Broadway" at the party to give the press a glimpse of Bombshell. Narratively questionable, but it provides a great backdrop for phone calls and deal-making from Eileen and Sam and Tom casually leeting Julia know—while she's at a work party with her husband—that they saw Frank kissing another woman on the street.

Then, mere moments after everyone reads that Derek Wills sexually harrassed the leading lady of Bombshell, leading to her departure, he leans in for a kiss with Karen. Again, at a party for the press. Ivy catches them, and he promptly fires her. I don't hear many people talking about the work, here, because Julia immediately confronts her husband, who lashes out in spectacular straight man fashion. He just doesn't get it. He's not in the biz,

After Ivy apologizes to Karen (and makes it about her shitty her life is), Julia admits to Tom that her marriage is over. Cut, print, girl, amirite? Thank god she'll have time to work now, because all the Boston reviews were raves for Tom and Karen, and all took Julia to task for her book. Which is strange, because she's usually so dedicated to the job! Or wait...

Tis moot, because "someone" tipped off the Feds about how Eileen financed the show and it's frozen. Karen is upset, but she's still Derek's muse and by god, she's gonna pull them both up by their bootstraps. Which means that she's drinking alone in a bar (staffed by surly Jeremy Jordan and fan boy Andy Mientus), where she hears their song "Broadway Here I Come" (quick reminder that it's a song about jumping to one's death as they fall to the street below: Broadway). And it's good, kid. It's real good. Could this be their next project as muse and director?

THE SONGS
"Cut Print Moving On," "Mama Makes Three," "On Broadway," "Don't Dream It's Over"

THE STARS
Krysta Rodriguez. Jordan Roth. Michael Riedel. Jeremy Jordan. Andy Mientus.

 
RELATED:
Today’s Most Popular News:
 X

Blocking belongs
on the stage,
not on websites.

Our website is made possible by
displaying online advertisements to our visitors.

Please consider supporting us by
whitelisting playbill.com with your ad blocker.
Thank you!