Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd...
WXXI Classical Presents Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Sunday October 22nd at 7 p.m. at The Little Theatre, followed by a discussion with WXXI Classical mid-day host Steve Johnson and Sondheim expert Eric Grode. Tickets on sale now as part of Spooky Season at The Little.
In Tim Burton's 2007 adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's beloved slasher-musical, Evil Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman) lusts for the beautiful wife of a London barber (Johnny Depp) and transports him to Australia for a crime he did not commit. Returning after 15 years and calling himself Sweeney Todd, the now-mad man vows revenge, applying his razor to unlucky customers and shuttling the bodies down to Mrs. Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter), who uses them in her meat-pie shop. Though many fall to his blade, he will not be satisfied until he slits Turpin’s throat.
Eric Grode is the director of the Goldring Arts Journalism & Communications Program at Syracuse University. He has worked since 2005 as a freelance theater critic and reporter for The New York Times, and his articles and reviews have also appeared in The Village Voice, New York magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Time Out New York, The Boston Phoenix and more than a dozen other publications. (One of those was The Sondheim Review, where he served as New York bureau chief.) He is the author of two books: “Hair: The Story of the Show That Defined a Generation” and “The Book of Broadway: The Definitive Plays and Musicals.”