Smash Musical Set to Debut on Broadway in Spring 2025 Featuring Tony Nominee Robyn Hurder.Linh

The producers of Smash announced a bombshell on Tuesday, Oct. 22.

Performances for the musical adaptation of the cult-favorite NBC series will officially begin on Broadway at the Imperial Theatre on Tuesday, March 11, 2025, ahead of an opening on Thursday, April 10.

Directed by five-time Tony winner Susan Stroman, the musical will be led by Robyn Hurder, who was Tony-nominated for her standout turn in Moulin Rouge! The Musical. She’ll play Ivy Lynn, the character Megan Hilty made famous on screen.

It’s not the same Ivy Lynn audiences met, however, so those expecting a backstage battle between her and fellow actress Karen Cartwright (played by Katharine McPhee) are in for a surprise.

Book writers Rick Elice (Jersey Boys, Peter and the Starcatcher) and Bob Martin (a Tony winner for writing The Drowsy Chaperone) have penned an entirely original story for Broadway, with mostly all-new characters. The TV’s show’s premise — about the making of a Marilyn Monroe biographical musical called “Bombshell” — is still in tact, as are the songs from Tony, Emmy and two-time Grammy winners Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman (Hairspray, Mary Poppins Returns, Some Like It Hot). But everything else will feel different.

“If you loved the TV series, it’s exactly what you want. And if you didn’t, we changed everything,” a video advertisement for the musical cheekily boasts.

Joining Hurder will be two-time Tony nominee Brooks Ashmanskas as Bombshell‘s director/choreographer ‘Nigel;’ stage veterans Krysta Rodriguez (Spring Awakening, The Addams Family, Into the Woods) and John Behlmann (Shucked, Tootsie, Significant Other) as Bombshell‘s songwriting and book-writing team ‘Tracy’ and ‘Jerry;’ as well as two-time Tony nominee Kristine Nielsen as acting-coach ‘Susan.’

Jacqueline B. Arnold will play producer ‘Anita,’ Bella Coppola assistant choreographer ‘Chloe,’ and Caroline Bowman and Casey Garvin will play two members of Bombshell‘s cast: ‘Karen’ and ‘Charlie,’ respectively.

The company will include Wendi Bergamini, Sarah Bowden, Jacob Burns, Deanna Cudjoe, Chelle Denton, Daniel Gaymon, Merritt David Janes, Megan Kane, David Paul Kidder, Ian Liberto, Libby Lloyd, McGee Maddox, Connor McRory, J Savage, Jake Trammel and Katie Webber. Additional casting will be announced shortly.

Most of the cast were a part of the musical’s last workshop in February 2023, which had open-rehearsal performances for lucky fans who were able to score a ticket.

Emmy-winning and Tony-nominated choreographer Joshua Bergasse (On the Town), who choreographed the television series, will reprise his role for the stage adaptation.

In addition to Shaiman and Wittman’s beloved Bombshell songs — including “The 20th Century Fox Mambo,” “They Just Keep Moving the Line,” and the Emmy-nominated “Let Me Be Your Star” — the duo have crafted new material for the stage.

the producing team of Smash, alongside lead producers Robert Greenblatt, Neil Meron and Steven Spielberg. It was a full-circle moment for Hudson, who appeared as a guest star on season 2.

“That show meant so much to me, and apparently it meant a whole lot to others as well,” Hudson, 42, said on her self-titled talk show, explaining that her her role as fictional actress Veronica Moore on the series was the first time she got to experience a taste of what it would be like to be on Broadway.

Years later, in 2015, Hudson would live out those dreams for real, starring as Shug Avery in the Tony-winning revival of The Color Purple. “Steven Spielberg was a producer,” she said of the production, which also starred Cynthia Erivo and Danielle Brooks. “I never would have guessed in that moment that one day, I would be able to be a producing partner beside him.”

Smash only had two season on NBC, after premiering in February 2012, but it’s popularity has grown in the years since. It’s currently streaming on Peacock.

The cast — including Debra Messing, Christian Borle and Jeremy Jordan — reunited in June 2015 to perform a charity benefit concert of the songs from “Bombshell” at the Minskoff Theatre in New York City. It sold out in 15 minutes, and was eventually streamed during the early days of the pandemic in 2019 as a benefit for The Actor’s Fund (Entertainment Community Fund).

Ironically, both Hilty and Borle will be back on the boards this season in new musicals of their own, she in Death Becomes Her and he in Tammy Faye. Jordan is starring in the ongoing run of last season’s new musical, The Great Gatsby.