"SWEENEY TODD" at Lyric Opera of Chicago
BY LUCIA MAURO
Many opera aficionados will argue that Stephen Sondheim’s 1979 Grand Guignol musical, "Sweeney Todd," has no business on the operatic stage. And, if we were to get technical, it does fall into the realm of music-theater – mainly via its Broadway vocal and instrumental stylizations and book writer Hugh Wheeler’s spoken dialogue.
But the story – and even the range of octaves required in this entwined melodic and deliciously macabre score – breathes with epic life. The work’s grotesque subject points to the ever-relevant human drive for vengeance and its mad futility. Man continues to devour man every day – just read the daily headlines.
So instead of spending a lot of time justifying or disputing why "Sweeney Todd" is or is not suitable for the Lyric Opera of Chicago – or if a more intimate staging would have a greater impact on audiences – I prefer to examine the crucial role this musical melodrama plays in reminding society of its ludicrous foibles.
Stage director Neil Armfield – kinetically joined by conductor (and Broadway veteran) Paul Gemignani – refuses to fling a concept at us, even as his Weill-Brechtian staging is anchored in a definitive point of view.
The Lyric’s staging, while not entirely flawless (the English words tend to get swallowed and require audiences to glance up at the supertitles), is solid, substantial, chilling, riotous and provocative – all the ingredients that make for a fulfilling theater experience.
And that’s quite a feat, considering that "Sweeney Todd" is essentially a show about cannibalism on many levels. In it, Sondheim’s characters rapturously toggle between greed, self-interest, morality and a bizarre sort of generosity. The title character, dubbed "the Demon Barber of Fleet Street," returns to his 19th century London barber shop after close to 20 years of unwarranted exile. The self-righteous yet evil Judge Turpin sent him away on a trumped-up charge in order to gain the affections of Todd’s beautiful wife (whom we later are told has poisoned herself).
Turpin also adopted their young daughter, Johanna. But when Johanna grows up, Turpin’s lust returns and he demands that she marry him. Meanwhile, Johanna – likened to a caged songbird – falls in love with Anthony, a seaman and friend of Todd’s. The barber reunites with the opportunistic Mrs. Lovett, a meat-pie vendor who has saved his razors and plans to win the vengeance-poisoned Todd’s love.
Together, they team up to murder Judge Turpin, but their scheme runs amuck. Blinded by rage, Todd slits the throat of anyone who sits in his chair. These unfortunate souls are then pushed through a shoot and ground up into fillings for Mrs. Lovett’s now fast-selling meat pies.
Yet, despite all the gristle and grisly shock value of the story, "Sweeney Todd" mirrors in the extreme a large-scale disregard for social well being at the expense of other’s lives and dignity. Everyone loses in this madhouse of a musical comedy. The judge, racked by repressed lust and religious guilt, withers into a cold, embittered speck; Todd himself soon pays the price of this throat-for-a-throat approach to justice (eventually destroying what he set out to defend).
Musically, Sondheim balances a mathematical dissonance (the famous ensemble piece, "Ballad of Sweeney Todd") with heart-piercing harmonies ("Pretty Women," "Not While I’m Around" and the various incarnations of "Johanna"). Dramatically, he swirls together with meticulous ferocity the bleakest of absurdist comedies, romance and vaudevillian farce. Yet no character is a cliché; not a single moment on stage is superfluous.
Famed Welsh bass-baritone Bryn Terfel as the titular cutthroat maintains an immovable focus throughout this intensely grounded production. But, within his luminous vocal clarity and laser gaze, occasional sparks of compassion and regret can be discerned.
He carries the staging, together with Timothy Nolen’s psychologically gnarled Judge Turpin; Celena Shafer’s pure-hearted Johanna; Nathan Gunn’s fervent Anthony; David Cangelosi’s naïve meat-pie assistant Tobias; and Bonaventura Bottone as the duplicitous snake-oil salesman Pirelli. Only Judith Christin’s ill-defined portrayal of the pivotal Mrs. Lovett throws off this staging’s synergistic balance of voices and characterizations. She gets wedged into an odd conundrum: Christin tries to tone down this stock Cockney figure at the same time she makes obvious character-actor choices.
Most effective is Brian Thomson’s bare-bones set framed by the suggestion of a steel cage and over-sized shadow play. The ingenious use of barber curtains lends an edge of clinical mystery to this Industrial Revolution-era production, lit with Dickensian grimness by Rory Dempster and pierced by sound designer Otts Munderloh’s screeching factory whistles. Tess Schofield’s costumes bridge the gap between confectionery and drab, further accented by Richard Jarvie’s cartoonish wigs and charcoal-black and chalk-white makeup – giving the actors a vampiric, flashlight-under-the-chin sheen.•
"Sweeney Todd" runs through December 22 at Lyric Opera of Chicago, 20 N. Wacker Drive. Tickets: $29-$152. Call 312-332-2244, ext. 5600 or log onto www.lyricopera.org.
