Best Series About Theater and Broadway

Key takeaways

• Smash gets most of the attention for putting a Broadway musical's development directly on screen, but the genre's actual best entry is a smaller, less-discussed Canadian show, Slings & Arrows, about a struggling Shakespeare festival, and it deserves to be named first rather than buried in a list.

Start here, not with the famous one: Slings & Arrows

This Canadian series, which ran for three six-episode seasons in the mid-2000s, follows a fictional Shakespeare festival through a different production each season, and it's one of the best pieces of television ever made about why people commit their whole lives to live performance despite the financial precarity and ego involved. It's underseen relative to its quality specifically because it never had a major American network's marketing behind it, which is exactly the kind of gap worth correcting here rather than repeating.

The one everyone already knows: Smash

NBC's 2012 series, following the development of a fictional Broadway musical about Marilyn Monroe, is worth watching for its detailed depiction of the actual mechanics of putting on a musical, backers' auditions, out-of-town tryouts, eleventh-hour rewrites, even though the show itself became a genuine punchline among some theater fans for its melodramatic subplots pulling focus from that process.

The one built around a real person: Fosse/Verdon

FX's miniseries, focused on choreographer-director Bob Fosse and dancer Gwen Verdon's decades-long creative and romantic partnership, treats the actual craft of Broadway choreography and direction with real specificity, and it's a different, more grounded register than Smash's fictionalized drama, since it's working from a documented real history rather than inventing one.

The one for a lighter, more absurdist take: Schmigadoon!

Apple TV+'s musical comedy sends its two leads into a town that only exists as a pastiche of classic golden-age musicals, and while it's more parody than drama, it demonstrates real, detailed knowledge of musical theater conventions, structure, and specific tropes being affectionately mocked, which requires genuine expertise to execute well.

What separates the genre's better entries from its weaker ones

The strongest theater shows treat the actual craft, blocking, choreography, the specific grind of an out-of-town tryout, as real plot material worth dramatizing in detail, rather than using "backstage at a Broadway show" purely as a glamorous setting for relationship drama that could happen anywhere. Slings & Arrows and Fosse/Verdon both clear that bar consistently; Smash clears it only intermittently.

Frequently asked questions

What's the best-kept-secret pick in this genre? Slings & Arrows, a Canadian series about a struggling Shakespeare festival, is one of the best pieces of television made about live theater, despite being underseen relative to its quality.

Is Smash considered good by theater fans? Mixed — it's praised for depicting the actual mechanics of mounting a Broadway musical in detail, but became a genuine punchline for melodramatic subplots that pulled focus from that process.

Is Fosse/Verdon based on real people? Yes, it's a dramatized but grounded account of choreographer-director Bob Fosse and dancer Gwen Verdon's real creative and romantic partnership.

Is Schmigadoon! a drama or a comedy? A comedy, specifically a musical parody, though it demonstrates genuine, detailed knowledge of golden-age musical theater conventions to execute its jokes well.

What separates the genre's stronger entries from weaker ones? Treating the actual craft, choreography, blocking, the tryout process, as real plot material, rather than using theater purely as a glamorous backdrop for generic relationship drama.

Should I start with Smash since it's the most well-known? Not necessarily — Slings & Arrows is the stronger overall show, even though Smash has broader name recognition.

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