Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		2.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.0

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert Blu-ray Movie Review

Attend the tale of upscaled video.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 29, 2016

For all of the incredible wonders the Blu-ray era has brought to lovers of the potential of home video, live stage performances of iconic musicals haven’t been particularly well represented. While there have been occasional releases like Victor/Victoria: The Broadway Musical, for the most part lovers of musicals have had to “make do” with the film versions of theatrical properties. Often film adaptations of Broadway (or West End) musicals are legendary in their own right (West Side Story, The Sound of Music, Cabaret), even if those film versions often seriously tweaked elements of the original stage versions. But perhaps just as frequently (and arguably even more frequently), film adaptations can somehow miss the mark and/or magic of the original stage presentations, due either to casting, ham fisted cutting of songs, or uninspired and uncinematic direction. Shout! Factory is now offering a new imprint called Shout Broadway that attempts to overcome this deficit in high definition presentations of iconic stage musicals—in their original stage formulations (more or less, anyway). The first three titles in this series are kind of interesting in a number of different ways, not the least of which is that one of them is not in fact a Broadway production, but a West End one ( Gypsy ), while the other two (Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert, Candide) aren’t fully staged productions, but rather concert readings.

Is there a darker musical in the entire annals of American theater than Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street? This rumination on the vagaries of fate, time, revenge and, let’s face it, pies filled with human flesh, was a breathtaking departure from Sondheim’s urbane and even urban musicals of the earlier 1970s, shows like Company, Follies and A Little Night Music. Sweeney Todd was decidedly more dour and depressing, along with being more quasi-operatic, than anything Sondheim had done before, and it was a sensation when it premiered on Broadway in 1979, sweeping many of that season’s major Tony awards. I took Shout’s simultaneous release of Gypsy a bit to task for its paltry (and weirdly “reinvented”) orchestrations, but one of the glories of this particular production is that it features the full complement of the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, something that adds even more weight and luster to Sondheim’s elegant music. That’s the plus side of this offering, which also unfortunately has a few issues.

Whatever faults Tim Burton’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street may be accused of having, one place where it excelled was in its production design, ably recreating the grimy, spooky world of mid-19th century England and the lair that Mrs. Lovett and Sweeney create for their hapless victims. (I'd also refer anyone not up to speed on the plot dynamics of the musical to refer to Casey Broadwater's review of the Burton film for salient information.) Alas, this concert reading has a few props to help establish its mood, but this is otherwise a staging that requires the audience to use its imagination, something that is perhaps not helpful in sustaining the Grand Guignol ambience of the show. Further complicating matters is the fact that the stage arrangement has the actors on what are basically pathways that weave in and out of the orchestra sections, something the further tends to draw the audience out of the story at hand.

Director Lonny Price had previously done much this same version in Manhattan with the New York Philharmonic and Patti LuPone and George Hearn as Mrs. Lovett and Sweeney. The cast is uniformly excellent here, and probably the chief reason to see this version, even if LuPone seems to be intentionally channeling Angela Lansbury (who famously created the role of Mrs. Lovett in the original Broadway production) in many of her vocal inflections. One of the unexpected pleasures of the interplay between Lovett and Sweeney in this version is how decidedly funny it often is despite its inherent bleakness, something that often tends to fall between the cracks of less nuanced productions. The supporting players in this version also have some great moments, including a nice falsetto-ish rendition of “Not While I’m Around” by Neil Patrick Harris.

This video version is evidently one that was used back in the day for PBS pledge drives, something that in and of itself is kind of funny (what was the swag offered for a big donation? — a bloody razor?). In some ways, though, this is a surprisingly “accessible” Sondheim show, despite its content and its complex score, something that probably made it a draw for even middlebrow audiences either at the theater or watching television at home. The physical production here is minimal, but the performances are quite viscerally involving, and anyone only familiar with the Burton film may find this interesting from a compare and contrast standpoint.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Shout! Factory with an AVC encoded 1080i (upconverted) transfer in 1.78:1. The Blu-ray disc also includes the original standard definition broadcast in 1.33:1, and those comparing the two will note there's some kind of clunky anamorphic stretching during the opening and closing credits in the 1.78:1 version in order to make everything "fit". The biggest problem here is simply this is a fairly ugly looking upscale, one with all of the anomalies videophiles usually associate with this technique. There's stair stepping on elements like the staff paper seen in on some of the musicians' music stands, and detail levels are often minimal at best (look at some of the midrange shots accompanying this review and you'll see that things like facial features are virtually nonexistent). Blacks are anemic and detail levels never pop very well unless the camera is seemingly pressing into the flesh of an actor like a razor (yes, that's a bit of hyperbole). Colors are kind of drab looking and overall this is a pretty drab looking video presentation, one that I'm kind of surprised Shout went to the trouble of even offering in a supposed high definition format. I sampled the standard definition version to see differences in framing and the like, and I have to say watching that version was actually a relatively more pleasurable experience than the supposed hi def version.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Luckily, this Blu-ray's DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mix is in decidedly better shape than its video counterpart. The San Francisco Symphony, under the direction of the very able Rob Fisher, plays with force and nuance, and I was particularly struck by the silvery higher strings in "The Ballad of Sweeney Todd". There are occasional spikes and valleys in volume, somewhat dependent on where various actors are singing from onstage, something that probably tends to indicate some inartful microphone placement. But LuPone and (especially) Hearn ring out with considerable authority and energize the musical consistently. Fidelity is fine and dynamic range surprisingly wide on this problem free track.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Both the high definition and standard definition submenus allow access to the following supplements:

• Making of Sweeney Todd (1080i; 11:57) features some nice interviews with Stephen Sondheim.


• Gypsy Trailer (1080i; 00:52)

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Concert Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I'm a little conflicted on this release for a couple of reasons. I tend not to really like staged readings to begin with, and with a piece like Sweeney Todd, that becomes even more problematic, since a feel for the time and place of the musical is important to understanding the almost Dickensian straits of several of the characters (this is the major reason I haven't rated this version more highly, despite some of its plus points, listed below). This version is also hobbled by some pretty ragged looking upscaling. On the plus side, the music is simply incredible, played by a full symphony orchestra and sung by a gaggle of top flight talent. Those interested may well want to think of this as a kind of "audio Blu-ray" with a less than convincing video counterpart, and for those, this release comes Recommended.