The Media and Penny Dreadfuls

Todd was arrested without incident, but when authorities arrived at Bell Yard for Mrs. Lovett, her pie-eating customers learned both about the murders and that they had consumed some of the victims. The crowd tried lynching her on the spot, but Lovett was quickly taken to Newgate Prison. She confessed to her and Todd's dark dealings before committing suicide, while Todd was granted a trial, found guilty, and eventually hung; all told, Sweeney Todd is believed to have murdered over 160 people.

The public voraciously followed these larger-than-life events, and newspaper publishers took advantage of this sudden interest to increase their print sales. Reporters combined rumors with facts, sensationalizing the story in such a way that Sweeney Todd soon became prime tabloid fodder and the stuff of urban legend; indeed, it's because of these numerous retellings that there are no accurate descriptions of Todd's actual appearance.

The obvious popularity of these real-crime stories, combined with a growing number of reading adults, inspired the creation of penny part magazines, so named because they contained serialized tales sold for one cent. Due to their graphic subject matter and as a comment on the writing quality, they soon became known as Penny Bloods, and later Penny Dreadfuls. The most popular of these Penny Dreadfuls was Thomas Peckett Prest's 1846 story entitled "The String of Pearls," featuring a Demon Barber named Sweeney Todd. Between Prest's story and Todd's history within popular culture, it wasn't long before this blood-soaked tale was adapted for the stage.

The Grand Guignol Tradition

"George Dibdin-Pitt was one of the most popular playwrights of his day," explains Stephen Sondheim. "He made Sweeney Todd into a play in the late 1840s and it became a big hit." While the story certainly spoke to the public's fascination with horror and the macabre, Pitt's Sweeney Todd also amazed audiences by styling itself like a French Grand Guignol melodrama.

Named after Le Theatre du Grand Guignol, which was founded by Oscar Metenier in 1897, Grand Guignol plays are known for their grisly stories and lavish special effects. Now considered a quaint form of entertainment that became obsolete with the success of horror movies in the 1960s, at the time of Pitt's Sweeney Todd production it was a stunning sight for audiences. That success inspired numerous other adaptations over the years, but it wasn't until the early 1970s that playwright and actor Christopher Bond wrote a version with significant changes. Bond inserted the Judge Turpin revenge plot, transforming Sweeney Todd from a simple thieving serial killer into a complex, haunted man.

"In 1973 I was in London and that's the version I saw," Sondheim says. "I've always been very fond of melodrama and I just thought this play would make a really good musical. So I asked Christopher Bond permission and then I wrote the musical."