"Don't Forget Me" is an original song introduced in the fifteenth episode of the first season of the musical TV series "Smash", entitled "Bombshell".
In the episode, the song is sung by Karen Cartwright (Katharine McPhee) as Marilyn Monroe during a Boston preview for the musical after having just taken over the role from Rebecca Duvall (Uma Thurman), who has been felled by illness.
[3] “Don’t Forget Me”, a final energetic ballad that led into a “Let Me Be Your Star” reprise [is an example of how the show's best element has always been its original music].
Even though I was furious that it was McPhee singing it and not Megan Hilty...the song moved me, and I thought it was a fitting way to end a musical about the life of Marilyn Monroe.
A tall order, but as Marilyn is the textbook definition of legend in our culture, it doesn't feel stretched, and even the fade-in of a large projection of her face comes at just the right moment.
Chris Rovzar of Vanity Fair comments that "the lyrics were terrible and the composition spotty", and questions whether this was because within the context of the episode, "Tom and Julia supposedly did write it in just three hours", or because Shaiman and Wittman had genuine faith on the song.
He described the music as in the style of "rejected Disney princess theme songs", and also criticized the out-of-place and cheesy lyrics, such as, ”when you sing happy birthday to someone you love/or see diamonds you wish were all free/ Please say that you won’t, I pray that you don’t forget me”.