Sweeney Todd

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
This article is about the character. For other uses, see Sweeney Todd (disambiguation).
Sweeney Todd
Johanna Barker
(Bond play and musical version)
NationalityBritish

Sweeney Todd is a fictional character who first appeared as the villain of the

legend. A barber from Fleet Street, Todd murders his customers with a straight razor and gives their corpses to Mrs. Lovett, his partner in crime, who bakes their flesh into meat pies. The tale has been retold many times since in various media.[1]

Claims that Sweeney Todd was a historical person[2][3] are disputed strongly by scholars,[4][5][6] although possible legendary prototypes exist.[7]

Plot synopsis

In the original version of the tale, Todd is a barber who kills his victims by pulling a lever as they sit in his barber chair. His victims fall backward through a revolving trap door into the basement of his shop, generally causing them to break their necks or skulls. In case they are alive, Todd goes to the basement and "polishes them off" (slitting their throats with his straight razor). In some adaptations, the murdering process is reversed, with Todd slitting his customers' throats before dispatching them into the basement through the revolving trap door. After Todd has robbed his dead victims of their goods, Mrs. Lovett, his partner in crime (in some later versions, his friend and/or lover), assists him in disposing of the bodies by baking their flesh into meat pies and selling them to the unsuspecting customers of her pie shop. Todd's barber shop is situated at 186 Fleet Street, London, next to St. Dunstan's church, and is connected to Mrs. Lovett's pie shop in nearby Bell Yard by means of an underground passage. In most versions of the story, he and Mrs. Lovett hire an unwitting orphan boy, Tobias Ragg, to serve the pies to customers.

Literary history

Sweeney Todd first appeared in a story titled The String of Pearls: A Romance. This penny dreadful was published in 18 weekly parts, in Edward Lloyd's magazine The People's Periodical and Family Library, issues 7–24, published 21 November 1846 to 20 March 1847. It was probably written by James Malcolm Rymer, though Thomas Peckett Prest has also been credited with it; possibly each worked on the serial from part to part. Other attributions include Edward P. Hingston, George Macfarren, and Albert Richard Smith.[7][8] During February/March 1847, before the serial was even completed, George Dibdin Pitt adapted The String of Pearls as a melodrama for the Britannia Theatre in Hoxton, east London. It was in this alternative version of the tale, rather than the original, that Todd acquired his catchphrase: "I'll polish him off".[7]

Lloyd published another, lengthier, penny part serial during 1847–1848, with 92 episodes. It was then published in book form in 1850 as The String of Pearls, subtitled "The Barber of Fleet Street. A Domestic Romance". This expanded version of the story was 732 pages long.[7] A plagiarised version of this book appeared in the United States c. 1852–1853 as Sweeney Todd: or the Ruffian Barber. A Tale of Terror of the Seas and the Mysteries of the City by "Captain Merry" (a pseudonym used by American author Harry Hazel, 1814–1889).[7]

In 1865, the French novelist Paul H.C. Féval (1816–1887), famous as a writer of horror and crime novels and short stories, referred to what he termed "L'Affaire de la Rue des Marmousets" in the introductory chapter to his book La Vampire.[9]

In 1875, Frederick Hazleton's c. 1865 dramatic adaptation Sweeney Todd, the Barber of Fleet Street: or the String of Pearls (see below) was published as volume 102 of Lacy's Acting Edition of Plays.[7]

A scholarly, annotated edition of the original 1846–1847 serial was published in volume form in 2007 by the Oxford University Press with the title of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, edited by Robert Mack.

Alleged historical basis

The original story of Sweeney Todd is from an older legend that may contain motifs from even earlier stories. Possibly the oldest reference to the story in its present form is found in the diary of the Swedish traveller Pehr Lindeström. In his diary, dating from the middle of the 17th century, the story is set in Calais, which is also where the author heard the story. The story includes all the details of the legend, except for the name of the character.[10][11] Another version relates to a supposed 1800 narrative of events in the rue de la Harpe, Paris, which appeared in an English version in Tell-Tale Magazine (London) under the title "A Terrific Story of the Rue de la Harpe".

In

Pickwick Papers (1836–1837), the servant Sam Weller says that a pieman used cats "for beefsteak, veal, and kidney, 'cording to the demand", and recommends that people should buy pies only "when you know the lady as made it, and is quite sure it ain't kitten."[12] Dickens then developed this in Martin Chuzzlewit (1843–1844), published two years before the appearance of Sweeney Todd in The String of Pearls (1846–1847), with a character named Tom Pinch who is grateful that his own "evil genius did not lead him into the dens of any of those preparers of cannibalic pastry, who are represented in many country legends as doing a lively retail business in the metropolis".[13]

Claims that Sweeney Todd was a real person were first made in the introduction to the 1850 (expanded) edition of The String of Pearls and have persisted to the present.[7] In two books,[2][3] Peter Haining argued that Sweeney Todd was a historical person who committed his crimes around 1800. Nevertheless, other researchers who have tried to verify his citations do not find anything in these sources to verify Haining's claims.[4][5][6]

In literature

A late (1890s) reference to the legend of the murderous barber can be found in the poem by the Australian

bush poet Banjo Paterson, "The Man from Ironbark
".

In his 2012 novel Dodger, Terry Pratchett portrays Sweeney Todd as a tragic character, having lost his mind after being exposed to the horrors of the Napoleonic Wars as a barber surgeon.

In performing arts

In stage productions

Justin Gaudoin and Phyllis Davis in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street at the Wharf Theater, June 2018
  • Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1973), a play by the British playwright Christopher Bond. This version of the story was the first to give Todd a slightly more sympathetic motive: he is Benjamin Barker, a barber convicted wrongfully who after 15 years in an Australian penal colony escapes and returns to London using the new name Sweeney Todd, only to find that Judge Turpin, who is responsible for his conviction, has raped his young wife and adopted his daughter. He at first plans to kill Turpin, but when his prey escapes, he swears vengeance on humanity in general and begins to slash his customers' throats. He goes into business with Mrs. Lovett, his former landlady, who bakes his victims' flesh into pies. At the end of the play, he finally gets his revenge by killing Turpin, but then unknowingly kills his own wife, who Mrs. Lovett had misled him into believing had died. After learning the truth, he kills Mrs. Lovett, but is in turn killed by Mrs. Lovett's assistant and surrogate son Tobias Ragg, who slits Todd's throat with his own razor.
  • Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. A Musical Thriller (1979), is a musical adaptation of Bond's play by Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler. The show began on Broadway in 1979 and in London's West End in 1980. The show won multiple awards including the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Musical. There have since been several revivals in the West End, on Broadway and elsewhere.
  • Empanada Loca (2015), a one-woman off-Broadway production written and directed by Aaron Mark for the LAByrinth Theater Company.[citation needed]

Dance

Movies

  • Sweeney Todd (1926), the first movie version of the story, a 15-minute British silent movie featuring G.A. Baughan in the title role, directed by George Dewhurst. The movie is now lost.[16]
  • Sweeney Todd (1928), a British silent movie featuring Moore Marriott as Sweeney Todd and Iris Darbyshire as Amelia Lovett. This is the earliest surviving movie adaptation.
  • Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1936), a movie version of the 19th-century melodrama featuring Tod Slaughter as Sweeney Todd and Stella Rho as Mrs. "Lovatt".
  • Bloodthirsty Butchers (1970), a horror movie with John Miranda as Sweeney Todd and Jane Helay as Maggie Lovett, directed by Andy Milligan.
  • Academy Awards
    , winning for Art Direction.

Music

Radio and audio plays

  • In 1932, Tod Slaughter recorded on Regal Zonophone Records an abridged version of the Sweeney Todd story based on his famous stage performance; this version was re-released during 2013 digitally along with a similarly abridged recorded version for Regal Zonophone of his stage performance in Maria Marten, or The Murder in the Red Barn.[17]
  • "The Strange Case of the Demon Barber" (January 8, 1946), an adaptation of the Sweeney Todd story featured in an episode of the radio drama The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. In this interpretation, an actor playing the character on stage begins to believe he is committing similar murders while sleepwalking, while Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson uncover evidence that may prove his sanity.
  • In 1947, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's CBC Stage Series broadcast a radio adaptation by Ronald Hambleton of the George Dibdin Pitt play featuring Mavor Moore as Todd, Jane Mallett as Mrs. Lovett, John Drainie as Tobias, Lloyd Bochner as Mark Ingestrie, Bernard Braden as Jarvis Williams, Lister Sinclair as The Guide and Arden Kaye as Johanna Oakley. The production was directed by Andrew Allan, with original music composed by Lucio Agostini.
  • In 1994, the 1993 National Theatre production was adapted and recorded for radio and broadcast on BBC Radio 2 with Denis Quilley as Todd and Julia McKenzie as Mrs. Lovett.
  • The second episode of the BBC Radio comedy series 1835, entitled "Haircut, Sir?" (broadcast in 2004) portrayed aristocrat Viscount Belport and his servant Ned (Jason Done) joining Sir Robert Peel's police force and encountering demon barber Sweeney Todd on their first case.
  • Sweeney Todd and the String of Pearls: An Audio Melodrama in Three Despicable Acts (2007), an audio play by
    Audie Awards
    for best audio drama, best original work, and achievement in production.
  • In March 2021, BBC Radio 4 broadcast Sweeney Todd and the String of Pearls, a two-part adaptation by Archie Scottney of the Prest novel/serial, directed by Rosalind Ayres and with Martin Jarvis as Sweeney Todd, Joanne Whalley as Mrs. Lovett, Rufus Sewell as Colonel Jeffries, Moira Quirk as Joanna and Ian Ogilvy as Major Bounce.[18]

Television

In comics

  • The character of Sweeney Todd is presented as a villain in
    Obsidian, is shown to be a fan of Sondheim's musical.[21]
  • Neil Gaiman and Michael Zulli were to have created a Sweeney Todd adaptation for Taboo, published by Steve Bissette and Tundra, but only completed a prologue.[22]
  • Classical Comics, a UK publisher creating graphic novel adaptations of classical literature, has produced a full colour, 176-page paperback, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2010),[23] with script adaptation by Sean M. Wilson, linework by Declan Shalvey; colouring by Jason Cardy & Kat Nicholson, and lettering by Jim Campbell.

In rhyming slang

In rhyming slang, Sweeney Todd is the Flying Squad (a branch of the UK's Metropolitan Police), which inspired the television series The Sweeney.

References

  1. ^ "Sweeney Todd synopsis".
  2. ^
    ISBN 0-584-10425-1
    .
  3. ^
    ISBN 1-85283-442-0
    .
  4. ^ a b "Man or myth? The making of Sweeney Todd" (Press release). BBC Press Office. August 12, 2005. Retrieved November 15, 2006.
  5. ^ a b Duff, Oliver (January 3, 2006). "Sweeney Todd: fact". The Independent. London, England: Independent Print Ltd. Archived from the original on July 1, 2006. Retrieved November 15, 2006. (Full text)
  6. ^ a b "True or False?". Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert. KQED. 2001. Retrieved November 15, 2006.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h Mack, Robert (2007). "Introduction". Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.
  8. ^ "Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street". PBS.org. Retrieved 11 February 2006.
  9. ^ Féval, Paul. La Vampire – via gutenberg.org.
  10. ^ "The demon barber of Calais, a 17th century Sweeney Todd". 13 November 2006.
  11. ^ "Sweeney Todd, Pehr Lindeström och myten om den mordiska barberaren". 17 September 2018.
  12. ISBN 978-0140436112
    .
  13. ISBN 978-0199554003
    .
  14. ^ "Sweeney Todd credits". IBDB. Retrieved 24 February 2020
  15. ^ Crescent Theatre
  16. ISBN 978-1936168-68-2
    .
  17. ^ "Tod Slaughter – the Master of Melodrama in Sweeney Todd – the Demon Barber of Fleet Street and Maria Marten, or The Murder in the Red Barn". Amazon.com.
  18. ^ “Sweeney Todd and the String of Pearls”. BBC. Retrieved 24 July 2021
  19. ^ "Oh My, Meat Pie". Food Network. Retrieved 24 July 2021
  20. ^ [1]. Time Magazine. Retrieved 31 July 2023
  21. ^ Manhunter (2004) #23 (August 2006)
  22. ^ Schiff, Len (Fall 2005). "Into the Stratosphere: "TSR" Talks with Neil Gaiman". The Sondheim Review. 12 (1): 39, 41 – via Proquest.
  23. ISBN 978-1-906332-79-2
    .

Further reading

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sweeney Todd.
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