Should Be Just That

Smash, the Broadway-set musical drama pilot that features a multidimensional gay character played by Christian Borle, has been picked up by NBC as a series for the fall television season.

Borle, a Tony award nominee for Legally Blonde and who recently appeared in the revival of Angels in America, will star as an openly gay composer, alongside Debra Messing as a lyricist. The series focuses on the making of a Broadway musical about Marilyn Monroe.

The order for the series was expected, as Smash comes with an impossibly tony pedigree. It's a passion project of Robert Greenblat, NBC's entertainment chair. Steven Spielberg, whose idea inspired the pilot, will executive produce along with How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying's Craig Zadan and Neil Meron, Dreamworks' Justin Falvey and Darryl Frank, songwriting team Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, and screenwriter Theresa Rebeck.

Shaiman and Wittman, the Tony Award-winning songwriting team behind Hairspray and the current Catch Me If You Can, will write the songs of the show within the series. Michael Mayer, the Tony Award-winning director of Spring Awakening helmed the pilot.