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Sweeney Todd

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Sweeney Todd is a fictional villain. A barber and serial killer, the character appears in various English language works starting in the mid-19th century. His weapon of choice is a straight razor, with which he cuts his victim's throats; in some versions of the story his friend and accomplice, Margery (sometimes Nellie) Lovett, bakes the carcasses into meat pies. Whether Todd or Lovett actually existed remains a matter of debate.

Contents

Early history

Todd's first appearance may have been in a penny dreadful called The People's Periodical, in issue 7, dated November 21, 1846. The story in which he appeared was titled "The String of Pearls: A Romance," and was probably written by Thomas Prest, who created a number of other gruesome villains. He tended to base his horror stories on grains of truth, sometimes gaining inspiration from real crime reports in The Times.

Background

It is often claimed nowadays that the Sweeney Todd story is factual, but this is extremely doubtful. According to the tale, Todd was tried at the Old Bailey and hanged at Tyburn in January 1802, before a large crowd. However, no record of the trial can be found in the Old Bailey sessions papers or the Newgate Calendar, nor are there any contemporary press reports either of the trial or of the hanging. As early as 1878 a contributor to Notes and Queries (series 5, vol.10, 21 September 1878) noted this absence of authentic non-fictional sources.Notes and Queries series 5, vol.10, 21 September 1878 Peter Haining, while arguing for historical reality, does not offer verifiable specifics.Haining, Peter. Sweeney Todd: The Real Story of the Demon Barber of Fleet|Sweeney Todd, 1993

An episode in the legend of Saint Nicholas may represent a yet earlier version. This episode, which likely developed in the eleventh century, sees three clerks seeking accommodations for the night. In the night, their host murders them and, on the advice of his wife, decides to dispose of the evidence by baking the clerks into meat pies. The saint eventually resurrects the young scholars.

The cannibalistic trait of the story goes back as far as the myth of Pelops, while the moralistic symbolism of eating one’s guests appears in social satire such as Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal. The myth’s imagery of meat pies made from people is almost certainly an allusion to the finale of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus and the original Roman tale on which it was based. There is thought to have been a Jacobin barber who cut the throats of his customers during the French Revolution, though for politics rather than profit. Likewise, the 15th Century Scottish figure Sawney Bean led a family of thieves who are believed to have feasted on their victims. It may be relevant that 'Sweeney' could be considered a typically Irish name, just as 'Sawney' is a Scottish one; ethnic prejudice could underly both legends.

Adaptations

The String of Pearls was made into a play in 1847 by George Dibdin Pitt and opened at the Hoxton Theatre, with the subtitle The Fiend of Fleet Street and billed as 'founded on fact'. It was something of a success, and the story spread by word of mouth and took on the quality of an urban legend.

In 1936 a film version of this story was made, called Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, starring Tod Slaughter in the title role and produced in a lurid, melodramatic style reminiscent of the era of silent films.

Various versions of the tale were staples of the British music hall for the rest of the century.

"Sweeney Todd, The Barber" is a song which assumes its audience knows the stage version and claims that such a character in real life was even more remarkable. Stanley Holloway, who recorded it in 1956, attributed it to R. P. Weston, a song writer active from 1906 to 1934.

In the Two Ronnies Sketchbook, the duo produce a sketch called "Teeny Todd" with Ronnie Corbett in the title role. The sketch features the barber cutting throats with a razor and then pulling a lever to send his victims into the baker's shop below.

The British playwright Christopher Bond wrote a 1973 play titled Sweeney Todd. This version of the story was the first to give Todd a motive other than pure greed: He is a wrongfully imprisoned barber named Benjamin Barker who returns to London after fifteen years in Australia under the name Sweeney Todd to find that the Judge responsible for his imprisonment has raped his wife and she has taken poison. He swears revenge, but when he is thwarted in his revenge, he goes mad and begins to slash the throats of his customers.

In 1998, Ben Kingsley and Joanna Lumley starred in the John Schlesinger-directed The Tale Of Sweeney Todd, a television movie commissioned by Sky for which Kingsley received a Screen Actors Guild Best Actor nomination.

A BBC television drama version with a screenplay written by Joshua St Johnston and starring Ray Winstone and Essie Davis was broadcast on BBC One on 3 January 2006.

Sweeney Todd is a major villain in the musical comedy Sherlock Holmes and the Invaders from Mars.

Musical

Stephen Sondheim composed the musical theatre play Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, with book by Hugh Wheeler and based on the Bond play. The character of Margery Lovett was renamed Nellie Lovett for this version of the story. Sondheim called it a "musical thriller" and (due to its sparse non-sung dialogue) "virtually an opera". This modern example of grand guignol originally appeared on Broadway in 1979 in a production directed by Harold Prince and starring Angela Lansbury and Len Cariou. A smaller-scale 1989 revival at Circle in the Square starred Bob Gunton and Beth Fowler under the direction of Susan Schulman. It was revived again in October, 2005 and as of May 2006 continues to play on Broadway.

The musical was televised twice. In 1982 a full-scale production featuring the national touring cast aired and won three Emmys. This version starred Lansbury and George Hearn, who took over the role of Sweeney on Broadway after Len Cariou's departure. The second was a concert version presented on PBS in 2000, starring Hearn and Patti LuPone and directed by Lonny Price.

In 2004 John Doyle directed a revival of the musical at the Watermill Theatre in Newbury, which subsequently transferred to the West End's Trafalgar Studios and then the New Ambassadors Theatre. Without an orchestra, the actors themselves played the score. This production marked the first time in nearly ten years that Sondheim had been presented in the commercial West End. The production transferred to Broadway in 2005, with a cast headed by Tony Award nominees Michael Cerveris and Patti LuPone. It is currently playing at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre.

Tim Burton is rumoured to be directing a screen adaptation of the musical[[Citing sources citation needed]] starring Johnny Depp for release in 2008.

Trivia

The phrase "Sweeney Todd" is also Cockney rhyming slang for the Flying Squad, giving rise to the shortened form "The Sweeney" (the British 1970's Thames Television TV police show The Sweeney took the name from this form).

In the British Army during World War II, soldiers named Sweeney were routinely nicknamed "Todd," and Todds known as "Sweeney", after the well-known story.

In his 1993 book , the horror and crime story writer Peter Haining argues that Sweeney Todd was a historical figure committing his crimes around 1800, citing a number of sources. However, his claims have not been widely accepted, and other researchers who have checked his claims believe them to be wholly unsupported.

In DC Comics latest Manhunter series, man calling himself Sweeney Todd wielding a psi-weapon style razor is killing innocent women and calling them whores in an attempt to combine Todd with Jack the Ripper.

References

External links

 

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