Sweeny Todd: The demon Barber of Fleet Street, The Musical
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Random blog day boo yah. As you should know Fridays is random blog day were we talk anything and everything and pretty much run with it. Today's blog is on the musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.
The Musical called Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street also known as just Sweeney Todd is a musical written by Stephan Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler-who wrote the book. The musical graced the Broadway stage in 1979 followed by the West-End stage in 1980, winning the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Olivier award for Best New Musical. Since its inception there has been many revivals and adaptions including a movie featuring Johnny Depp, Helena Bonan Carter and Alan Rickman amongst its cast.
Sweeney Todd is a fictional Character, who originally appeared as the villian of the Penny dreadful serial “The String of Pearls” (1846-1847). Due to being rewritten various times the story of Sweeney Todd killing his customers with a straight razors and giving their bodies to his neighbour and partner in crime Mrs Lovett to bake into pies resulted in various media claiming the story and the character of Todd was true, However it has been strongly disputed by scholars, though It is possible prototypes exist allowing the story to become 19th Century Melodrama and a London Legend.
The String of Pearls, the penny dreadful, Sweeney Todd was apart of was written and published in a weekly magazine during the winter of 1846-47. Set in 1785, the story of Sweeney Todd follows him as he goes on a murder spree, all the stories plot points would go onto be used in various later adaptions. The Story was fully turned into a play before the ending had been printed with an expanded edition appearing in 1850, an American version following in 1852 and a new play by 1865. By the 1870's the Victorians were Familiar with the Character of Sweeney Todd.
The Musical is based off writer Christopher Bonds play which he released in 1970, Bond introduced the psychological backstory and motivation for Todd's criminal deeds in the form of a ruthless Judge exiling Todd to Australia and raping Todd's wife which drove her mad. Sondheim conceived the musical aspects in 1973 after watching Bond's play at the Theatre Royal Stratford East. The play and ultimately the musical can thank Bonds sophisticated plot and language tinkering giving some significant elevation in the stories lurid nature. Sondheim was heard to observe “It had weight to it...because Bond had written certain characters in blank verse and had infused into it plot elements from Jacobean tragedy and The Count of Monte Cristo, He was able to tale all these disparate elements that had been in existence rather dully for a hundred and some odd year and make them into a first rate play”
James Malcolm Rymer (1814-1884) a 19th century British writer and Thomas Peckett (or Preskett) Prest (1819-1859) a British writer, journalist and Musician. Are remembered as the Co-Creators of the Fictional story of Sweeney Todd: the “Demon Barber”. Whilst Rymer is mainly known as a writer having wrote various Penny dreadfuls with Sweeney Todd being his literary debut, Peckett-Prest spent time as a journalist, he also spent time as a musician before joining Edward Lloyd's publishing factory and writing several penny dreadfuls under various pseudonyms including Bos before joining forces with Rymer.
Christopher Godfrey Bond (Born in 1945) is a British actor, Playwright and Theatre Director whose 1970 retelling of Sweeney Todd contributed to Stephan's Sondheim's musical adaption of the same name, at the time he was the resident Dramatist (also known as a Playwright) at Victoria Theatre in Stoke-On-Trent (1970-71). Bond was also the Artistic Director of The Everyman Theatre in Liverpool (1976-78), the Director of Liverpool Playhouse (1981-83), and Artistic Director of Half Moon Playhouse (1984-89). Bond Currently lives in West Cornwall (as of writing this blog post)/
Born on March 22nd 1930, Stephan Joshua Sondheim was an American composer and Lyricist and is regarded as one of the most important figures to partake in 20th century Musical theatre. Sondheim is credited with reinventing the American Musical. Alongside his frequent fellow collaborators Harold Prince and James Lapine, Sondheim wrote various Broadway musicals which often tackled themes beyond traditional genre subjects, whilst addressing many darker elements of the human experience. Sondheim's music and lyrics are tinged with complexity, sophistication and an ambivalence about various aspects of life in general. Sondheim passed away due to Cardiovascular disease on November 26th 2021 leaving behind his Husband Jeffery Romley and a Musical Legacy to be enjoyed forever
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THE WEBSITE BIBLIOGRAPHY:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweeney_Todd:_The_Demon_Barber_of_Fleet_Street
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweeney_Todd
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Malcolm_Rymer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Peckett_Prest
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Bond
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Sondheim
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https://www.instagram.com/thebandersnatchblog/?hl=en
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