Sweeney Todd Napoleonic Wars as a barber surgeon. In rhyming slang, Sweeney Todd is the Flying Squad (a branch of the UK's Metropolitan Police), which inspired the television series "The Sweeney". Sweeney Todd Sweeney Todd is a fictional character who first appeared as the villain of the Victorian penny dreadful serial "The String of Pearls" (1846–47). The tale became a staple of Victorian melodrama and London urban legend, and has been retold many times since, most notably in the Tony award–winning by Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler. Claims that Sweeney Todd was a historical person are strongly disputed by scholars, although possible
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street New York, this tale of horrors was transformed into a mountain of steel in motion. Prince's scenic metaphor for "Sweeney Todd" was a 19th-century iron foundry moved from Rhode Island and reassembled on the stage, which critic Jack Kroll aptly described as "part cathedral, part factory, part prison, that dwarfed and degraded the swarming denizens of the lower orders." The massive scope of Prince's setting went beyond even Sondheim's intentions. Sondheim admits that his conception of the show differed from that of Prince: "Hal's metaphor is that the factory turns out Sweeney Todds. It turns out soulless, defeated, hopeless people.