Help with smoke tree

I sort of thought this would go under a Shrub forum or a Pruning forum, but couldn't find one. I hope someone on here can help. I have this smoke tree (it may be a smoke bush, instead of tree, but I'm not sure...) that is growing all crazy. This is the 4th spring I've had it. Originally I did not want to prune it because I heard somewhere that once you prune one, you keep having to do it and that it's better to let a smoke tree find it's natural shape. I'm all for that philosophy, but this tree grew all crazy. As you can see from the first picture, it just kind of grew straight up and looks kind of like it's begging for pruning. So I pruned it and it looked okay the first year, but didn't bloom because of the pruning. Like a crape myrtle that has been pruned (yes, I know you shouldn't really prune those, either...), multiple branches grew out from where each cut was made. So this year I didn't prune it and hence it's full of blooms, but also the branches are all drooped over. We did have alot of rain yesterday which made them bend, but I don't think they will snap back even when they're dry. So now it looks all crazy, which you will see in the second picture. So I need to know how I should prune this monster, if at all.

Here's a picture of how the tree looks now, so you can see the bent branches. My thought is to prune it almost to the ground and start over. What do you think? And If I did this in the fall instead of late winter, would I possibly have blooms next spring? Thanks for any advice!

There is a tree & shrub forum, but it's fine to post your question here too. I'm pretty sure with the dark foliage cultivars they actually recommend that you cut them way back every few years because new growth has the best foliage color. If you do that in the fall or winter you won't have blooms next year, but since they recommend you do it anyway and you're not happy with the shape, it's probably worth losing one year's worth of blooms.

Thanks ecrane. I found the Trees and Shrubs forum, so I will copy my post there as well.

The other thing you could consider is if you don't want to cut it all back at once, you could cut back a third of the branches every year. That way you'll always have some branches that can flower and some that are newer with the better foliage color. The key is when you prune a branch, go back close to the base, that way you should get new shoots from the base of the plant vs all the little branches from each cut which are probably what caused your problems here.

You have a "Grace" Smoke Tree - lovely, large leaves and a very impressive bloom in the spring on old wood. I cut mine back to about 18" each spring until I get the fullness and uniformity of shape I want, then I let it go and enjoy the "smoke plumes". This cultivar gets quite large, though, so make sure you have room to let it go. There are many folks who continue to cut this one back yearly to enjoy the beautiful leaves, but they never see the blooms. It's worth it to them for the color of the foliage and they maintain it successfully as a shrub rather than a tree.

This tree also propagates readily from softwood cuttings, so spring is a perfect time to start some new ones if you want more of this variety in your garden.