I went to see Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street at the Grand Theater on

October 10, 2023. It was an amazing production. Throughout the performance I noticed that Mr.

Todd had what looked to be dark circles around his eyes after the intermission, or just after A

Little Priest, which was an interesting choice that stood out to me. What also stood out to me

was what The Beadle did to that poor bird. If I had a nickel for every time I consumed a story

where an animal was brutally murdered that day, I would have two nickels. I would also like to

point out how in The Ballad of Sweeney Todd they emphasize the “T” sound in Fleet Street,

almost like the two words are being cut short. I also noticed how each member of the cast

handled it differently, which was a little bit odd to me.

Ms. Lovett also seems to drive the plot along similarly to the way Lady Macbeth drives

the plot, though while Lady Macbeth is wrought with guilt after the regicide, Ms. Lovett has no

clear heart for people other than herself and maybe Mr. Todd, though you could argue that

anything she does to help Mr. Todd was so that she could be held in higher regard. Her actress

was impeccable, seeming both insane and well put together.

Pretty much as soon as Sweeney steps off of what I’m assuming to be a train, the

beggar woman says “Hey, don’t I know you, mister?” setting up the ultimate twist from the

beginning in a cleverly unassuming manner. Later when it was revealed, it seemed almost like

traumatic flashbacks or even hallucinations (of course, she had to act out her parts from the

earlier silhouetted flashbacks, so it could be either). The whimpered soothing words while

cradling the shawl is reminiscent of a trauma response which lead me to question what actually

happened that caused her to choose to take the poison (After reading through the script again, I

understand what happened for certain, though I had guessed that from the way the judge had

descended upon Lucy in the flashback).

The inciting incident happened long before the show began. Fifteen years he was

wrongfully incarcerated while his wife was left alone with Judge Trupin and Beadle. Beadle is

complicit in the crimes of the judge as he willfully enacts his orders.

 The Judge is compoundingly despicable. Not only sending an innocent man to Australia,

but raping1 his wife in a ballroom full of people and then adopting her child only to later plan to

take her hand in marriage. Throughout the internet I see people despising older men who meet

someone when they are 16 and when they become of age they start being romantically

involved, thus I believe this would be perceived either the same or even worse seeing as she

was only a months old baby at the time (Of course, customs were different in the 19th century,

so this may not have been as terrible back then as now, though I am not sure.)

Mr. Todd’s actor was incredible. His emotions felt real, and the way that he had broken

down sobbing on stage when being told the entire story of his wife and child was enthralling. It

felt organic and sort of guttural. His anger after losing his chance to kill the judge also felt

organic, but it was more than just his raised voice that showed it. With his anger his acting also

became larger and almost clumsy, and as time went on it got clumsier and clumsier, ultimately

caring not who he killed which led him to kill in front of his own disguised daughter.

In the ending scene when Sweeney realizes what he has done, he manipulates Mrs.

Lovett into thinking he forgave her until they were close enough to the oven where he finally

threw her into the inferno. When Toby finds him, he knows he has his chance to end him and

slits Sweeney’s throat the way Sweeney had done to so many others. My memory of this is

fuzzy, but I recall him ending up in the oven at the end.

At the end, the closing number being The Ballad of Sweeney Todd was an excellent end

to the musical. Over the course of the number everyone comes out to sing a part of the ballad,

even Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett from the oven. With the final “Fleet Street” they wait for but

a moment and slam the oven doors shut, reverberating throughout the theater into silence.

1
From https://www.allmusicals.com/lyrics/sweeneytoddthedemonbarberoffleetstreet/script.htm, “The
Judge descends on Lucy, raping her.