Schmigadoon! season 2 review: Darkness on the edge of tune town
Cecily Strong and Keegan-Michael Key head to Schmicago in the Apple TV Plus musical's sophomore outing
TV Reviews A Chorus Line
Season two of Schmigadoon!, dubbed Schmicago, is for a very specific type of theater kid—namely, the type who’d imagined what it would be like for Sally Bowles to make flower crowns with the Hair tribe, the Kit Kat Klub dancers to audition for A Chorus Line, and Sweeney Todd to collaborate with Miss Hannigan on a new ingredient. So yeah. If jazz hands and fishnet tights scare you, you’ve been warned. After spoofing the saccharine Golden Age musicals of the 1940s and ’50s in season one, Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio’s show, which kicks off its sophomore outing on April 5 on Apple TV+, spotlights the edgier, darker ones of the 1960s and ’70s.
In the season premiere, after returning to their real lives post-Schmigadoon, Melissa (Cecily Strong) and Josh (Keegan-Michael Key) are too touched, too moved, too changed by their experience. So the now-married couple dons their backpacks and goes out in search of Schmigadoon once more. Instead, they stumble upon Schmicago, a town full of seedy clubs, shady characters, and all that jazz. Martin Short returns as the Leprechaun, who mandates that they have to stay until they make a happy ending. Naturally, the two wind up at the center of the town drama, this time in the form of a murder mystery.
If the juxtaposition between season two’s grittiness and season one’s bright-eyed and bushy-tailed tributes to musicals like Brigadoon, Carousel, and Oklahoma! feels jarring, then the show has done its job. Musicals like Chicago, Cabaret, and Hair represented a change in the theatrical guard when they hit the scene, reflecting the fast-changing political and cultural landscapes of their times.
Yet despite the magnitude of these musicals when they premiered on Broadway, Schmigadoon! lovingly pokes fun at the self-seriousness of them, which is especially prevalent in a clear tribute to Sweet Charity’s “Big Spender.” What was seen as avant-garde half a century ago elicits shrugs from us nowadays. Still, if you can buy into the stakes, the world of Schmicago is sexy and seductive. The way the writers have cleverly woven together multiple musical motifs while peppering in as many winks as possible is genuinely impressive. The principal cast dazzles and delights, and it’s nicely rounded out by a dynamite ensemble.
In a nod to Pippin’s Leading Player and Cabaret’s Emcee, the audience is gifted Tituss Burgess as a narrator to guide us through the story, whose knack for camp, charm, and comedic timing elevate every scene he’s in. The other new principal cast member for season two is Broadway veteran Patrick Page, who seamlessly slips into his villainous character Octavious Kratt (an ode to Sweeney Todd’s Judge Turpin) with his booming bass voice and sinister facial expressions.
Returning cast members are back too, inhabiting new characters: Dove Cameron becomes Jenny Banks, in reference to Cabaret’s Sally Bowles; Jaime Camil is Sergeant Rivera, like Les Misérables’ Inspector Javert; Kristin Chenoweth is Miss Coldwell, Annie’s Miss Hannigan with the Cockney accent of Sweeney Todd’s Mrs. Lovett; Alan Cumming is Dooley Finn, almost identical to Sweeney Todd; Ariana DeBose stops by to do her thing as Cabaret’s Emcee; Ann Harada is Madam Frau, likened to Cabaret’s Fraüline Schneider; Jane Krakowski is Bobby Flanagan, in an homage to Chicago’s Billy Flynn, with some Roxie Hart overtones; and Aaron Tveit is now Topher, the leader of a tribe à la Hair and Godspell.
Phew. So. While all of the returners bring their musical-theater chops, Krakowski and Tveit end up shining the most. The former has an uncanny ability to be wholeheartedly invested in the world, but with a simple flutter of her eyelashes or sly grin, she lets us know that she is very much in on the joke—or, perhaps, that she even has a secret joke of her own. Tveit, whose resumé is filled with mostly serious, romantic leading men, proves that he has much more to offer, showcasing a strong understanding of farcical comedy with his playful performance.
The splendid scenic design and costume design bring in details that will make eagle-eyed fans squeal with glee, too. (Look for several buildings honoring the era’s iconic musical theater songwriters Fred Ebb, Jerry Herman, John Kander, Stephen Schwartz, and Stephen Sondheim, plus Hair tribe member Michael sporting a vest in the style of Les Misérables’ Enjolras.) And as for the music: After picking up an Emmy for season one’s “Corn Puddin’,” Paul once again skillfully captures the essence of the genre and time period here. There are plenty of catchy tunes to choose from, but a tribute to Company’s “You Could Drive A Person Crazy” is our vote for the standout.
If this all sounds like the show’s comedy comes from inside jokes and musical references, well, yes, a lot of it does. But luckily, Schmigadoon! doesn’t take itself too seriously, which adds to its charm and helps bring in the non-theater kids who might not get this kicker: Leave your fields to flower, leave your cheese to sour, and join us in the wonderful and whimsical world of Schmicago.
Schmigadoon! season 2 premieres April 5 on Apple TV+
38 Comments
I mean this in the most positive possible way, but I am truly baffled as to how this show got a second season. It feels like a show for like 15 people that exit in the world and I’m one of them. I am excited to have this back in my rotation.
came here to say the same thing. (except i am not one of them)either an executive with the right amount of power can keep this greenlit, or this is quietly a huge success for them. i can’t imagine it’s cheap to make?
I loved the first one. I am so glad there is a second.
I am also very glad to see it return, as I was delightfully surprised by the first. The Schmicago idea is genius, I think. Schmigadoon was fun and lasted just long enough to mine the setting and move on.
While, as a big musical nerd, I wasn’t completely won over by season 1, I think it plays into a number of factors that (I guess?!) made it enough of a success to continue. A big one is that it has a ton of musical theatre Easter eggs for musical fans, but its parody was on such a basic, general level that even people who dislike musicals would be able to get into that (it’s gotten to be a bit lazy how many musicals play into this audience, by winking to them “We know it’s stupid how we break into song at every opportunity—we’re with you on that, so enjoy this ironically!”)
Beetlejuice did it the best, although I found its songs overall lacking. But god that movie winked more than any other musical before it, and was better for it.
Yeah, that was my take away with Beetlejuice too, actually (down to thinking they handled the “we know we’re a musical” gimmick well, but being underwhelmed with the songs.)
I’m just going to enjoy this show for as long as we have it, and not wonder about the whys.
Someone on another site was complaining about the conceit of using different decades and saying how it would “limit” them on seasons, and I was like “it’s cute that you think 6 seasons is likely when most of us were shocked season 2 is real.” I loved season 1, but also figured it was an unlikely renewal.That said it did have some minor Emmy buzz with its choreography (and Corn Puddin’ won for original song) and I believe the streaming on the music was decent. Given part of Apple+’s goal is to make you need multiple apple products that kind of tracks.
I’m Ruth, and I love Kenny Meade Depot.
a show for like 15 people that exist in the worldThis is literally the pitch for every Apple+ show. They’re legitimately confused as to why everyone’s watching a show about a sketch character who somehow becomes a Premier League manager, thinking “we tried so hard to fail… what happened?”
I don’t like musicals, know nothing about them but the most vagueliest pop culture references, and I loves the first season.
Your comment reminds me of how I felt about Galavant. If you haven’t seen it, you should!
You beat me to it—I was going to say the same thing. In fact, wasn’t the opening number of season 2 of Galavant about how shocked everyone was about having been renewed for a second season?Season 2 gave me my favorite musical number from the series—our hirsute hero and effete villain take refuge in a pub they’ve stumbled upon in the forest, but when the queen appears they discover it’s not quite the safe haven they thought it was.
They definitely did a song like that. I haven’t been able to rewatch it because I like to work while re-watching shows and this show requires full attention!
I don’t know that I’d call Chicago or Sweeney Todd “self-serious”. Sweeney Todd especially is practically already a dark comedy. It’s not meant to be set in a serious world, it’s a send up of penny dreadfuls and operas. But even then, not the serious operas, but the lurid B-movie kind that were already not particularly serious. A parody of that feels like it’s missed a few points, if the only take away is “It’s dark, unlike the golden age musicals which were silly!” It is every bit as silly and maximalist as the Golden Age musicals parodied in season one, but probably much more self aware. Chicago is also meant to be, more than anything, fun.
Ha I wrote my overly rambly long post before reading yours—but I’m glad someone else commented on how self-serious is really not a good term to describe this era of musicals (especially odd since the word was used here to describe Sweet Charity, especially.)
Sondheim always maintained (slightly disingenuously) that Sweeney Todd at heart was meant to give the viewer all the lurid, ridiculous yet fun, thrills of a real old fashioned melodrama. (Tim Burton bleeds out a lot of Sweeney’s comedy which may influence the POV of those who only know the movie, but still…)
Like I said above, I don’t think the self-serious criticism can really be applied to musicals until the megamusical trend (and even so, it’s more true of the “Golden Age” R&H type musicals than it was of the 1970s shows that, to varying levels, deconstructed those types of shows anyway.)
I hated Burton’s Sweeney Todd for that exact reason. Well, and b/c ….. Depp.
I saw the film adaptation of Chicago the other day – and binging many Fosse, Sondheim etc aadaptations in prep for this season – and I totally get the self serious critique: these musicals even present themselves as “you are going to see the most epic and transcendent story ever” without a touch of irony. To me that is the part of them that irritates me the most.
You had me at Schmicago.
I enjoyed so much about the first season, that I feel like such a grouch for how much it also annoyed me—especially as it went on. Look, I’m a Sondheim fanatic so I don’t need my musical leads to be “likeable” but Josh, especially, was so off-putting, I have no idea why we were meant to want him and Melissa to be together. He didn’t seem to want it himself, particularly. I also thought the early parodies (Aaron Tveit as a Billy Bigelow type) were better than the later ones.
But I’m eager to give this one a shot, especially since the 60s and especially the 70s are my favourite era for Broadway musicals (funny how even back then Broadway fans were proclaiming the death of the musical—and now they’re classics.) The 40s and 50s musicals the first season parodied (especially movie musicals I think, which were much more rosy-cheeked than Broadway at that era was, which was actually starting to often deal with darker material notably in Carousel and South Pacific) always felt too much of an easy target, and one that is the go-to style whenever SNL or anywhere else parodies musicals.
This has me slightly concerned though:
“Yet despite the magnitude of these musicals when they premiered on Broadway, Schmigadoon! lovingly pokes fun at the self-seriousness of them, which is especially prevalent in a clear tribute to Sweet Charity’s “Big Spender.” What was seen as avant-garde half a century ago elicits shrugs from us nowadays.”
Sweet Charity was never seen as avant-garde—Fosse was always in the business of (brilliantly) making hugely commercial musical theatre. Even Sondheim always pointed out that his love and interest was in mainstream *commercial* musicals (although his Pacific Overtures, which I’m sure will NOT be referenced in this show, comes as close to avant-garde as any musical on Broadway has.)
I also don’t think most of the shows it’s meaning to parody *are* self-serious. Certainly, Sweet Charity (a Neil Simon comedy, for crying out loud) is full on musical comedy. Chicago, especially in its Fosse original version, does mock the audience to an extent, but I don’t think we reached the age of the “self-serious” musical until the magamusical trend of the 80s, especially Les Miz (and don’t get me wrong, I like Les Miz, but…) And I’m guessing if we get a final season, that will be the target.
I am starting to believe that I am not a fan of musicals because I see t h e lack of self awareness and humour in Sweet Charity and Chicago. I like a lot of things about those musicals, but the edginess is not one of them.
I dunno, both shows (the stage versions, anyway) KNOW they’re musicals, especially Chicago where each song is announced as a different vaudeville act. That seems to mean self-awareness to me?
I AM interested in checking this out. Personally I should be the prime target audience and really enjoy a wide range of musicals. That said, I like the first season at the start, but I felt like it dragged as it went, and I lost interest by the end. The second season seems like they are possibly hitting their stride with the concept, but we’ll see.
Completely agreed.
I was the opposite. I found the first season a bit of a slog to start, but enjoyed it more as it went on. (Frankly, I was impressed that they managed to wait until the fifth episode to give Kirsten Chenoweth her big number, but it was well worth it.)
Season 3: Schmicked
I was thinking Les Schmiserables, or maybe Schment.
Definitely Schment.
Schmoseph and His Smechnicolour Shmeamcoat?
That’s just dumb enough to work.
Les Schmiz, not to be confused with The Schmiz (with Dorothy and Toto).
I love this show and I’ll watch all the way through Season 10: Schmamilton.
If they’re jumping through musical history two decades at a time, I’m not sure how they’re gonna pad it till season 10 😉
There was only one musical TV series that truly earned its existence, and that was Galavant. I’m still quite upset about it ending. Every single song was so well written and performed, and if there are any fans of this (about 15, I hear), then you should check it out and join us other 15 Galavant fans. We could double our numbers over night!
There was only one musical TV series that truly earned its existence*Crazy Ex-Girlfriend stares at you through a window*
I hang my head in fucking shame
Aaron Tveit is now Topher, the leader of a tribe à la Hair and Godspell.He’s also Pippin.