Watching the "Pilot" now I'm only 11-minutes in but it's already VERY convincingly "New York" in filming (duh! locale), theme and dialogue. So far so good.
Many great TV series have started with weaker pilots than this. This is an exceptionally strong start to what could be quite a wonderful show. My biggest concern before was McPhee, but this pilot (as well as the preview for the series) totally sold me. She's very likable and isn't at all a waif. They give her enough edge to make her worthy of being rooted for. Surprisingly, I didn't care for Brian D'arcy James, but that could be the character and I'm sure they'll flesh him out as the series goes on.
Yes, I'm sold. And with 8 episodes already in-the-can (as detailed in last month's "New York Magazine") I think we can have faith the writing and directing will be just as solid as the "Pilot"
Little tidits that tickled me:
Brian d'Arcy James playing an excellent husband who gives a damn!
The script rips at Riedel (oh he must be gooey with gloat at even being mentioned)
Curtis Holbrook and Spencer Liff among the dapper baseball dancers
The sparkly pin-stripes on the baseball uniforms. And that terrifically simple editing of rehearsal/stage cuts. And that awesome (albeit, short) shot from outside/above the rehearsal room glass windows.
Dylan Baker is a perpetually-reliable cameo-actor
During the Times Square shot (Angelica Houston and Jack Davenport) you can see all the tourists (the real ones) along the margins of the screen crowding behind their invisible lines, watching the cameras/actors strut by.
Annaleigh Ashford bit as a big-bowed Marilyn auditioner
I wanna know how Karen (Katharine McPhee) got an audition so early in the morning/process. Is she Equity? Ha!
McPhee's "Beautiful" was astounding. I think I like it better than Aguilera's (mostly because she had terrific diction!) And awwww how sweet was that, when she sang it to her boyfriend!?
ARGH! The "I don't give a sh!t"-ness that Ivy's mom (via phonecall) gives her is just ARGH!
I just LOVE seeing all these NYC "regular" locations (like Park Slope and Riverside Drive, etc)
HELLO!!! alternative plot-lines! Adoption, Boyfriend, F*cking the Director, Producer's Divorce, Hire/Fire the Assistant, and Julia gets a crush!
Slight worry, won't they have to decide between hilty and McPhee pretty quickly given they are the only two to get called back. And how they've promoted the show around them....
No need to condescend phyllis but if you've promoted the show around that concept i can hope they can really hold the intrest or it's going to go by real fast.
Just got through watching the pilot. It's fantastic and very smart exposition. We're introduced to all the major players and their story lines and it doesn't feel like we're being hit over the head with any of it. The acting is great and so is the music. It was only 46 minutes and I was invested in everyone. I hope this finds an audience.
And random person- I'm sure they've figured it out.
OK I really liked it and don't want my complaints to sound like I didn't but I do have some complaints just to go against all the praise.
(I know some on here seem to feel that you can't like a show and still have some major problems with it, but ...)
I can accept the story is the hoariest of theatre story cliches. "Aging chorus girl has her last shot at a lead against the pure midwestern ingenue (whose parents even say ridiculous things like how expensive New York is and she should move and settle instead of persuing her dreams) and also is up against a director who wants to sleep with her--will she maintain her purity for her love". Because there's some reality there and it's done with a clever and realistic back drop.
But some of the dialogue really should have been re-written especially between Debra Messing and her husband where I literally felt in the first few scenes I could anticipate every second line. Angelica had to spout out some embarassing ones too (ie the usual divorce stuff "You slept with every blonde who spread her legs" "We once shared LOVE" etc), but she's amazing so made it work. The hispanic guy had that ridiculous I love theatre speech "Theatre was the only place where I truly felt [dramatic pause] WHOLE". All of that stuff I felt could have been perfect if they just hadn't gone for the cliche line. It also would help the cliche plot seem fresher. For some reason the second half was much better (in general and cliche line wise) so maybe it was just a rough setup.
I also hated Marc Shaiman's underscore. His original music so far is fab--and original music is NEVER good on tv show musicals--witness the original songs for Glee last year, or the infamous Cop Rock--so I'm really impressed with that (but he is a talented Broadway composer as Hairspray the musical proves, and Catch Me If You Can the musical doesn't prove--he also is amazing at doing Broadway pastiches, songs that are meant to sound like other Broadway composers which is what he does here with the compoing team modelled after woman-and-gay-best-friend Broadway composers Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flahherty, who also consulted). But his underscore SUCKS. I HATED the light comedic tinkly music that telegraphed every even slightly comic scene. That may sound like a silly complaint but...
This is a theatre fag comment from me and probably won't bug people not as into musicals as me, but... I'm glad they brought up the flop Marilyn musical.But then they say their musical will be different because it will truly get to the heart, sadness, etc, of Marilyn. So umm to show this they do a number about her romance with DiMagio which is a camptastic, Bob Fosse esque production number comparing baseball to getting gang banged? Don't get me wrong I LOVED the number and how it cut between rehearsal and performance, but so far from this (and the great, but cliched other songs) I don't buy that this is some deep take on the Marilyn story, or that as a serious musical it would stand a chance in current musical theatre. As a parody about Marilyn, sure.
(I also wish it was a bit more adult--another reason I'd prefer Showtime had done it as originally planned. It's a 10pm drama, but most of it is flat out family friendly wholesome fare, and then suddenly we have the seduction attempt scene, or a song and dance all about crotches and baseball bats--I've already read that NBC toned down the pilot from what was scripted for Showtime, and I think that was a mistake).
And I wanted more songs. Three for a pilot seemed weak--and not one till half way in. I guess I want it to be a bit more of a musical. That said some have really complained about them singing "in real life" in the streets for the finale--but I loved that and felt that it was earned--by that point the audience should have warmed up to the use of singing to further the story, and I hope there's a lot more of it.
Again I wanna repeat I largely really enjoyed it, but do have some major issues that I hope were largely there just because it was the pilot with a lot of setup. There are so many directions the story could go--for nearly all of the characters, so I hope it doesn't become focused primarily on a cliche version of the "aging chorus girl vs the ingenue" as some of the previews imply, though it is refreshing to see both portrayed sympathetically. I also appreciated that they kept SOO many theatre geek references in (even things like the composer has a Follies original production poster proudly on display) and didn't worry about explaining them to mainstream America, but this is another reason I think it would be more suited to cable than network tv which by definition has to appeal to middle america as much as possible.
Or get completely derailed... It's true that for the many flawed pilots that lead to great shows, the opposite can be true when all the time, premise and money goes into the pilot.
I really enjoyed this and actually watched it twice. I loved the final number.
Can someone tell me who Savannah Wise played, as I looked for her both times, and couldn't figure out who she was. On the other hand, I recognized Annaleigh Ashford immediately.
Kudos to Joshua Bergasse for his wonderfully energetic choreography.
I watched it last night and loved it. I don't even know why there's a competition, though. Megan Hilty looks more like Marilyn Monroe and she nailed the numbers she was in. McPhee sang well and I really cared for her character, but I just don't think she fits the part as much as Megan Hilty does.
Is it sad that I would actually be excited about this if it were a real musical? Heh.
I took today's lunch hour to watch this on my iPad and let me say that I loved every single second of it.
The references to Marilyn: An American Fable. The window cards on the wall. The Reidel references. The beautiful shots of manhattan. Megan Hilty and Katherine McPhee were excellent. Loved that the musical numbers/auditions switched from rehearsal to actual performance. The "director tries to seduce ingenue" scene was very tastefully done instead of being corny and cliched. Annaleigh Ashford. Spencer Liff! Curtis Holbrook! Anjelica freakin' Houston!!
I can't wait to see more. I feel like this show was written just for me. Truly outstanding.
I liked it enough to look forward to the show. I'm not seeing the "star" in Katherine McPhee's character, but I like the character. Megan Hilty's Ivy pulls at my heart more.
It's true that for the many flawed pilots that lead to great shows, the opposite can be true when all the time, premise and money goes into the pilot. 
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Posted: 1/16/12 at 02:53pm