Sweeney Todd 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 legendary prototypes exist. In the original version of the tale, Todd is a barber who dispatches his victims by pulling a lever as they sit in his barber chair.
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street she told him: "Oh God – I didn't know this was what ["Sweeney Todd"] was about. It's nothing to do with Grand Guignol. It's the story of your [own] life." What Sondheim thought of as "a small horror piece" eventually became a colossal portrait of the Industrial Revolution in the hands of director Hal Prince. At first, Prince was not interested in directing the show; to him it was just another melodrama, not very experimental structurally. Then he discovered a metaphor which expanded the story into an essay on the human condition. On the stage of the Uris Theater in