While many of the players were starting to explore other musical opportunities alongside "Bombshell," Eileen was all in. And she wasn't unaware of the negative reviews Julia's book had gotten. So she hired a dramaturg to help Julia out with the story on the latest episode of "Smash." Only Eileen wasn't completely honest about what he was there to do.
The dramaturg was looking to almost completely rewrite the entire musical, changing the focus from Joe DiMaggio to Marilyn Monroe's more sensual side. He also disagreed with Julia's take on Marilyn as a tragic and victimized character. He saw her more as an opportunistic glory-hound. That's a pretty big gap to cross if the two hoped to meet in the middle.
Julia, of course, had no intentions of meeting him anywhere. She stormed into Eileen's office and declared that she would absolutely not work with that man. She said she won't destroy her work.
"No one has invested more in this show than I have," Eileen told her calmly. "And if you don’t want to do the work, I will find someone who will." Looks like the dramaturg is here to stay.
The stand-off between Eileen and Julia made HuffPost TV's list of "eyerolls" from the episode. But could the retooling of "Bombshell" help the show like the retooling of "Smash" was supposed to help it?
"Smash" continues every Tuesday at 10 p.m. EST on NBC.
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