Sweeney Todd Character Analysis

Before Sweeney Todd got his close-up on the silver screen in 2007, and even before he made his Broadway debut, Sweeney Todd made his first appearance in The String of Pearls, a Victorian penny dreadful from 1846. Penny dreadfuls were cheap fiction that were usually released in a weekly manner and were sold for a British penny. The story of Sweeney Todd takes place in the boom of Great Britain’s Industrial Revolution, when new technology was appearing on every corner, along with old fears rearing their ugly heads once again. Penny dreadfuls were meant for opening up all of humanity’s most basic fears, death, gore, and most prominently, cannibalism. They were written to terrify the public, to act as a cheap thrill for the common folk. The premise

of Sweeney Todd’s character remained much the same throughout the various adaptations, though each with their varying degrees of difference from the original story. Between the differences, the most notable was the existence of certain characters, the way in which Todd makes his end, and the relationships between Sweeney Todd and other characters.
The musical did a fine job of expanding upon the original story of Sweeney Todd, giving him proper motive for his deeds and thus making him all the more compelling of a character. Todd’s wife, Lucy Barker did not exist in the first incarnation of Sweeney Todd’s tale. The character was added in a stage adaptation that premiered just six years earlier than the iconic musical adaptation with music written by Steven Sondheim. The play from 1973, written by Christopher Bond was the first to introduce more than just a murderous nature to the titular character in giving him a lost family. In addition to the creation of a lost family for the demonic barber, a different love interest was created for Johanna, replacing the character Mark Ingestrie from the original story. Ingestrie was replaced with Anthony Hope, who played a different part in the story, despite fulfilling the role of Johanna’s love interest. Mark Ingestrie and Anthony Hope were both sailors in their respective versions of the story, though their resemblance ends there. The difference between the two is in the friendship that Anthony had with the musical’s version of Todd wherein the original, Mark was imprisoned beneath the pie shop and forced into servitude as the chef for Mrs. Lovett’s pie shop. While Ingestrie spent much of the original tale below the pie shop, Hope spent most of the musical attempting to woo and marry Johanna. Coinciding with Johanna’s romantic interest is Judge Turpin, created to be the main villain of the show wherein The String of Pearls, Todd was the main villain and without a sympathetic trait while Judge Turpin did not even exist. Only an older man by the name of Mr. Lupin existed in the penny dreadful. Though he did share a wish to marry Johanna with the later created Judge Turpin, he was only a minor character and not the villain. Judge Turpin, who caused Sweeney Todd to be sent out of England for a number of years in the stage adaptations took on the role of the main antagonist in his pursuit of stealing away both Sweeney’s wife as well as his daughter. At the heart, each adaptation is the same in premise, but very different in characters.
One thing that is fairly consistent within the various versions of Sweeney Todd’s murderous tale is this: The demonic barber meets his end in the end. Still, there are always changes made from adaptation to adaptation, and the way in which Sweeney Todd bites the dust has not always been the same. Young Tobias Ragg has had the pleasure of finishing the demon barber off in several versions, most notably in the musical where he ironically kills Todd with his own razor blade. Still, it has not always gone to the young lad to bring Sweeney Todd to his maker. In the original penny dreadful, Todd was hanged rather than having his throat slit. Certainly, it makes sense that the death of Sweeney Todd was made more ironic, killed by his own blade. It makes for a more complete end.
There is a shift in dynamic between Sweeney Todd and several characters from one version of the story to the other.

The major difference between the original story and the musical is the fact that Sweeney Todd was given a family in the show. Having a wife and daughter makes Todd a much more sympathetic character. While Lucy Barker was created specifically to be the demon barber’s wife, Johanna has existed throughout each retelling of the story but with different connections to Todd. In the original, she was of no relation to the barber and was the daughter of Mr. Oakley. In each adaptation, the interaction between Todd and Johanna has been limited whether they were portrayed as being related or not. Aside from familial relations, there have been differences in the relationship between Todd and Lovett from the original to the retellings, though never too different. In the original, the two are nothing more than business partners, Todd providing the meat while Lovett provided the disposal. The relationship is similar in the musical aside from the fact of Lovett’s infatuation with Todd. Her obsession ultimately led to her death in the musical while in the original tale, it was simply Todd’s decision that he was done with her. Similarly to Todd, Lovett has always met her end in every adaptation, though not always the same way, whether it be poisoned, as in the original, or thrown into the fire as in the musical. It’s a curious thing how some relationships can be changed so much

and yet so little at the same time.
Sweeney Todd is not an easy thing to sum up in three short pages of comparison.

Between The String of Pearls and the musical adaptation, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, there are even more adaptations to take into account. There have been several movies, with their own interpretations of characters, their own liberties in the story, and their own take on relationships. Still, it can be said that Sweeney Todd will always be portrayed as murderous barber whose victims are turned into meat pies by Mrs. Lovett. Some characters may change, Todd’s death may vary, and relationships may shift, but the essence of Sweeney Todd will always be the

same.