Later, Todd and Lovett meet rival barber Adolfo Pirelli in a town square. She hints at being romantically interested in Todd, but he either doesn't realize or ignores her, and instead is fixated on the razors, swearing that he will get revenge on Turpin. Lovett leads Todd upstairs and reveals that she's kept his set of straight razors for fifteen years. Lovett reveals that she committed suicide via poison. Barker (now Todd) asks what happened to Lucy, and Mrs. Lovett tells him that his wife Lucy was sexually assaulted by Judge Turpin, who had him sent to prison on a false charge, and that Turpin now has custody of his sixteen-year-old daughter Johanna. He introduces himself with the alias Sweeney Todd. Lovett an absent-minded baker who has turned the first floor into a pie shop and restaurant. Barker explains that he was sent to prison on a false charge by the corrupt Judge Turpin, who wanted Barker's wife Lucy.Īnthony and Barker go their separate ways, and Barker heads to his old apartment, which is now owned by Mrs.

Anthony, confused, asks him what he means. A disgruntled Benjamin Barker enters, scoffing at Anthony's optimism and telling him that life is unfair and someday he will learn how cruel reality is. The story opens with the wide-eyed young sailor Anthony Hope singing about how happy he is to be back in London. Sweeney Todd uses cannibalism as a metaphor for capitalism in a similar vein to Delicatessen and A Modest Proposal and has been widely praised as a dark and effective satirical comedy that raises macabre questions about the moral cost of consumerism. Sondheim takes the original story (in which Todd kills his customers and fleeces his customers' belongings for fun and financial gain) and further develops Todd as a character, reimagining him as a once kind man destroyed by an exploitative system. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (often referred to as just Sweeney Todd) is a dark musical satire by Stephen Sondheim, first staged in 1979 with Len Cariou and Angela Lansbury as the murderous Sweeney Todd and the maniacal Mrs.

Sweeney todd sondheim