Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

“You are young.

Life has been kind to you.

You will learn.”

Todd differentiates himself from Anthony by calling attention to Anthony’s youth and implied naivety. His prediction that Anthony will “learn” foreshadows the naivety that fatally defined Todd (then Benjamin Barker) in his youth. Because of his suffering, however, Todd equates the wisdom of adult age with a cynical worldview. These lines therefore set up a dichotomy between naivety and wisdom, which underpins the character dynamics throughout the play.

“There’s a hole in the world

Like a great black pit

And it’s filled with people

Who are filled with shit

And the vermin of the world

Inhabit it.”

Todd’s assertion that London is a void that holds the world’s moral rot functions as a mantra for his character, reminding him that the suffering he experienced is an everyday experience for so many common people in London. This passage repeats as a lyrical motif throughout the play, most especially in Todd’s epiphany toward the end of Act I, and serves as a fundamental premise for the revenge of the working class as a theme.

“Wot I calls

Enterprise,

Popping pussies into pies.

Wouldn’t do in my shop—

Just the thought of it’s enough to make you sick.

And I’m telling you them pussy cats is quick.”

In this passage, Mrs. Lovett presents herself as being morally better off than her desperate neighbor, Mrs. Mooney, who resorts to using stray cat meat for her pies. However, this passage also ends with a subtle hint that Mrs. Lovett’s self-description may be unreliable. Her observation that cats are “quick” suggests that she tried Mrs. Mooney’s supply practices for herself but lacked the skill to catch any cats. Mrs. Lovett’s subtle hypocrisy indicates why she is so quick to suggest the supply practice that defines her and Todd’s business partnership at the end of Act I.

“Fifteen years dreaming that, perhaps, I might come home to a loving wife and child […] Let them quake in their boots—Judge Turpin and the Beadle—for their hour has come.”

Before he declares his intent to pursue revenge, Todd expresses a lost hope: Initially, he hoped to reunite with his family upon his return to London. However, Mrs. Lovett willfully misrepresents his family’s fate in a way that makes him believe that his wish is a lost cause, which effectively dooms Mrs. Lovett to her fate at the end of the play. Todd commits himself wholeheartedly to the pursuit of revenge, signaling The Perils of Obsession as one of the play’s major themes.

“You’ve been locked out of sight

All these years—

Like me, my friend.

Well, I’ve come home

To find you waiting.

Home,

And we’re together,

And we’ll do wonders,

Won’t we?”

When Todd reunites with his razors, he not only refers to them as his “friends” he also draws a parallel between himself and them, driving the idea that the razors are the only things that understand his experiences in the last decade. This bestows an added level of personification to the razors since, apart from treating them like they have human qualities, he also characterizes them, elevating his instruments to the status of allies.

“How can you remain,

Staring at the rain,

Maddened by the stars?

How is it you sing anything?”

In this passage, Johanna uses the birds as a symbol of her upbringing in the confines of Judge Turpin’s mansion. Although the judge’s protection keeps her safe, she is painfully aware of her inability to access the world around her. This passage therefore drives her primary character motivation, which is a desire to escape from the cage of Turpin’s protection.

“We blind ’em, sir. That’s what we always does. Blind ’em and, not knowing night from day, they sing and sing without stopping, pretty creatures.”

This passage adds to the birds’ symbolism, revealing that they were deliberately blinded to elicit their songs. Applied to Johanna, the symbol of the birds also suggests her naivety. Turpin’s protectiveness prevents her from being able to discern the world with wisdom and prudence. This is why she quickly falls for Anthony, seeing him as the first chance at escape.

“Can’t you think of nothing else? Always broodin’ away on yer wrongs what happened heaven knows how many years ago—

[…]

Soon will come.

Soon will last.

Wait.”

Mrs. Lovett chastises Todd for his single-mindedness, hinting at her lack of interest in his pursuit of revenge. She urges Todd to wait for “soon,” anticipating that he will eventually forget his obsession in time. In this sense, her hope that “[s]oon will last” is meant to console her more than reassure him.

“It is perhaps remiss of me to close the court so early, but the stench of those miserable wretches at the bar was so offensive to my nostrils I feared my eagerness for fresher air might well impair the soundness of my judgment.”

This passage exposes Turpin’s casual abuse of his station. Shortly after sentencing a young boy to death, Turpin confides that he had only closed the court early because he couldn’t stand the smell of his defendants. This implies that Turpin passes judgment without deference to the ideals of the law but within the limits of his comfort. In Turpin’s court, justice is therefore temperamental and arbitrary, often to the disadvantage of the poor.

“Thus armed with a shaven face, my lord,

Some eau de cologne to brace my lord

And musk to enhance the chase, my lord,

You’ll dazzle the girl until

She bows to your every will.”

The Beadle assumes that Turpin’s inability to woo Johanna is due to his grooming, ignoring the true source of her discomfort: that Turpin raised her as his ward. This passage therefore underlines their villainous qualities as they cast aside all good sensibility to favor personal indulgences. Just as it had been with Lucy years earlier, wooing Johanna is merely a “chase” for them.

“I loved you

Even as I saw you,

Even as it does not

Matter that I still

Don’t know your name, sir.”

The trope of “love at first sight” is common in musicals, but the authors subvert it here, complicating Anthony and Johanna’s whirlwind romance by suggesting that the lovers view each other in idealized ways, ignoring each other’s flaws. This passage exemplifies this idea by underlining that Johanna supposedly loves Anthony without even knowing his name. Her attraction to him is based largely on the perception that he can help her escape Turpin’s mansion. Outside of this, she has no real knowledge of Anthony as a person, let alone his name.

“Oh well, that’s a different matter! What a relief, dear! For a moment I thought you’d lost your marbles.”

Mrs. Lovett’s reaction functions as a form of irony, suggesting that Todd made a reasonable moral judgment given the circumstances that drove him to kill Pirelli. In fact, Todd is falling deeper into the perils of obsession with his distorted sense of morals. Mrs. Lovett is an appropriate accomplice for Todd, giving passive approval to his actions and framing them as morally normative.

“How they make a man sing!

Proof of heaven

As you’re living—

Pretty women, sir!”

Todd and Turpin sing this passage together, giving Turpin cause to relax in Todd’s presence because he sees Todd as a kindred soul. Unbeknownst to Turpin, the context behind these lines is different for Todd, who sings them knowing that Turpin is referring to his daughter and wife. This brings his anger toward Turpin to a fever pitch, nearly giving him the chance to execute his revenge.

“Because the lives of the wicked should be—

(slashes at the air)

Made brief.

For the rest of us, death

Will be a relief—

We all deserve to die!”

Musicals often contain “I wish” songs, in which the main character outlines their desires that they will pursue during their story arc, and the authors subvert that trope near the end of Act I when Todd calls for the death of all humankind. This wish includes those who are innocent of the crimes that certain people commit to exploit others. In his vision of the world, Todd feels that death will finally put an end to the suffering that he and others like him experience. He therefore idealizes death as the force that equalizes all people, representing a form of justice more real than the one enforced by Turpin.

“And my Lucy lies in ashes

And I’ll never see my girl again,

But the work waits,

I’m alive at last

(Exalted)

And I’m full of joy!”

Todd’s epiphany ends with a brief diversion back into his grief for the loss of Lucy and Johanna. This is meant to remind the audience that Todd is essentially experiencing a mental health crisis. He immediately tries to mask this by firming his resolve to work, killing as many customers as possible to satisfy his nihilism. Wheeler and Sondheim emphasize the dissonance in Todd’s epiphany by having him declare that he is joyful despite his grief. This signals that Todd’s joy from killing is provisional, intended to soothe the pain of losing his family.

“It’s man devouring man, my dear

And who are we

To deny it in here?”

When Mrs. Lovett suggests the plan to dispose of Todd’s victims in her meat pies, their refrain echoes the critical sentiments of Todd’s epiphany. They state that their business practice merely draws a parallel between the exploitative systems that exist in the world around them. By turning this system against Todd’s well-to-do customers, they drive the revenge of the working class as a theme.

“Bless my eyes—!

(For she sees the MAN WITH CAP, from Act I,

approaching the barber sign. He looks up and

rings TODD’s bell—three times)

Fresh supplies!”

Mrs. Lovett refers to one of Todd’s customers as “fresh supplies,” extending the metaphor of people as products in the Victorian era. Key to this passage is the context of Mrs. Lovett’s growing prosperity. By voicing her excitement that the man ascending Todd’s parlor will soon die, she reverses the social dynamic of the play: Todd and Mrs. Lovett are now industrialists who thrive on the suffering of others.

“Do they think that walls can hide you?

Even now I’m at your window.

I am in the dark beside you,

Buried sweetly in your yellow hair,

Johanna.”

Anthony’s resolution to seek Johanna out bears a sinister undertone as he indicates that he will stalk the darkest corners of her room to be closer to her. This casts Anthony in a paradoxical light since he characterizes himself as though he were a ghost or something fearful. Wheeler and Sondheim use this to underscore the terrifying aspects of his obsession with Johanna.

“And in the darkness when I’m blind

With what I can’t forget—

[…]

It’s always morning in my mind,

My little lamb, my pet,

Johanna.”

Despite his epiphany near the end of Act I, Todd is occasionally sentimental, indicating that he wrestles with his commitment to revenge. He uses an apostrophe to express that the idea of Johanna keeps his mind from falling into complete darkness, which represents the trauma of his memories and the nihilism it inspired. With Johanna’s memory, he finds an escape from the darkness, driving Tenderness Versus Wrath as a theme.

“Warn ’em all of the witch’s spell!

There it is, there it is, the unholy smell!”

The beggar woman urges the people around her to beware of Mrs. Lovett, whom she identifies as a “witch” when the “unholy” smoke belches from her bakehouse chimney. This hints at the idea that the beggar woman knows something about Mrs. Lovett that remains unrevealed. The passage thus serves as foreshadowing for the play’s final plot twist, which reveals that the beggar woman is Todd’s supposedly dead wife, Lucy.

“By the sea, in our nest

We could share our kippers

With the odd paying guest

From the weekend trippers,

Have a nice sunny suite

For the gest to rest in—

Now and then, you could do the guest in—

By the sea.

Married nice and proper.”

Mrs. Lovett’s vision of seaside retirement signals her aspiration toward upward mobility. Moving away from London doesn’t represent her desire to turn away from the distorted morals of their present life so much as it suggests her wish to beautify and legitimize it. She suggests this by including the possibility that Todd can continue his murderous business practice by the sea, interrupting an idyllic train of thought with a dissonant permission for murder.

“Being close and being clever

Ain’t like being true.

I don’t need to, I won’t never

Hide a thing from you,

Like some.”

Tobias promises complete trust and transparency to Mrs. Lovett. This drives the dramatic irony of his situation, in which he believes that he must be skeptical of Todd on Mrs. Lovett’s behalf. In truth, Tobias’s promise to be true emphasizes the extent of Mrs. Lovett’s exploitation of his labor in lying about Signor Pirelli’s fate.

“Better you should think she was dead

Yes, I lied ’cos I love you! […]

I’d be twice the wife she was!”

This passage exposes Mrs. Lovett’s true motivations for manipulating Todd. Despite Todd’s stated wish to reunite with his family, Mrs. Lovett explains that she made the judgment call to withhold the truth from him because it would not bring him the peace he was expecting. Her manipulation is the factor that causes him to turn against her, which is why he similarly uses manipulation to lead her to her death.