Tim Burton Re-Imagines Sweeney Todd Into A Dark, Dynamic Film

Maverick director Tim Burton (“Planet of the Apes,” “Batman”) takes the award-winning musical sensation “Sweeney Todd” and reinvents it into an edgy, compelling, dramatic thriller starring perennial collaborator Johnny Depp.

“There’s always a possibility it might upset the purists because it’s not the show, and there are numbers that are not in it,” muses Burton. “A movie like this is a strange gamble because it’s an R-rated musical, it’s got blood in it and people that go to Broadway shows don’t usually go to see slasher films and people who see slasher films don’t usually go to Broadway shows.”

For fans of the original musical, “Sweeney Todd” composer Stephen Sondheim does acknowledge that some material was cut. But, he adds, “I urge them as much as possible to leave their memory of the stage show outside the door, because unlike all other movies of stage musicals that I know, this really is an attempt to take the material and completely transform it into a movie. The nice thing about ‘Sweeney Todd’ is that this is not a movie of the stage show. This is a movie based on the stage show.”

“Tim is the perfect director for ‘Sweeney Todd,’” says producer Richard D. Zanuck. “There is such an affinity between the subject matter and Tim’s style and sensibility. He is a stylist but also at his heart he’s a dramatist who just wants to tell a simple, human love story.” 

“He’s a perfect fit,” says Sondheim of Burton. “In many ways it’s his simplest film, his most direct film, but you can see that he’s telling a story he really likes. It’s a story that has enough incident in it so he doesn’t have to invent extracurricular stuff. He has enthusiasm for the piece and he just goes straight for the jugular.”

“Sweeney Todd” marks Depp and Burton’s sixth film together, after “Edward Scissorhands,” “Ed Wood,” “Sleepy Hollow,” “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and “Corpse Bride.” “They are like any good team with almost an unspoken way of doing things, and can practically read each other’s minds,” says Zanuck. “Johnny looks to Tim for guidance and Tim looks to Johnny for taking what he has outlined and pushing it a little further. They really love each other and would do anything for each other.  It’s a deep friendship, and they’re both lovely people, fun to work with and hard-working.  And they’re both at the top of their game. So the combination is wonderful in terms of freshness and inventiveness.”

“Every time Johnny and I work together we try to do something different – and singing for a whole movie is not something we’re used to,” says Burton. “You never just want to feel like, ‘Okay, that was easy. What’s next?’ Johnny and I always want to stretch ourselves, and this was a perfect outlet for that.” 

As for Johnny Depp, who is considered to be one of his generation’s finest actors, whose stock has skyrocketed in recent years thanks to his starring role as Jack Sparrow in the global smash trilogy, “Pirates of the Caribbean,” playing Sweeney Todd was thinking of himself as not the killer but the victim.  

In this film, Depp is Benjamin Barker who is unjustly sent to prison, and vows revenge not only for that cruel punishment but for the devastating consequences of what happened to his wife and daughter.  When he returns to reopen his barber shop, he becomes Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street who “shaved the heads of gentleman who never thereafter were heard from again.”

 “When we first meet Sweeney Todd he’s a very mysterious character,” says screenwriter John Logan. “He doesn’t say a lot but you know from his eyes that there is something haunting him, that he has a secret, that his past is haunting him, literally haunting him. As the story goes on, we learn what led him to this very dark place. He’s just escaped from penal servitude in Australia. He was floating on a raft in the middle of the ocean, trying to make his way to London because he is on a mission of revenge. He wants revenge on the people who essentially destroyed his life.”

 “Sweeney’s obviously a dark figure,” Depp reflects, “but I think quite a sensitive figure, hyper-sensitive and has experienced something very dark and traumatic in his life, a grave injustice. But I always saw him as a victim. I mean, anyone who is victimized to that degree and then turns around and becomes a murderer, can’t be all there. I always saw him as a little bit slow. Not dumb, just a half-step behind. The rug was pulled out from under his perfect life, his perfect world. He was in a 15-year hellhole. The only reason he came back was to eliminate the people who had done him wrong.

“He’s incapable of feeling happy,” adds Depp, “unless this corner has been turned and he’s that much closer to his objective, which is slaughtering the people who have wronged him.”

“Johnny’s performance is quite remarkable,” says composer Sondheim from whose musical play the film was based on. “Sweeney’s desire for revenge and the simmering anger and hurt that he feels carry the story forward, and Johnny finds the most remarkable variety within that narrow set of emotions. The intensity is at a boil all the time and he never drops it. It’s real anger.”

Helena Bonham Carter joins the cast as Sweeney Todd’s “partner in crime.” “The absolute core of Mrs. Lovett is that she’s in love with Sweeney Todd who never notices her,” says Bonham Carter. “He doesn’t even look at her, except when she comes up with the genius idea of how to dispose of his bodies when, suddenly, she’s visible. And she is a good partner, a good foil for him, because whereas he’s a total introvert, she’s extroverted. She’s practical and, I think, a lot cleverer, frankly. She was Sweeney’s landlord 15 years ago, when he was married. So when Sweeney comes back from Australia and finds her, she gives him back his old room, above her pie shop. But the thing is, she’s always been in love with Sweeney. And I don’t think he gives two hoots about Mrs. Lovett. He’s so obsessed with avenging his wife’s death. But there’s something quite crucial she fails to tell him…”

Even she was Burton’s choice, still Sondheim was asked to watch all the candidates’ audition tapes. “He said, ‘I think she is far and away the best,’” recalls producer Richard D. Zanuck. “Not voice-wise, because there were some real skilled singers, but voice and personality and look and everything, she was Mrs. Lovett.”

“That was probably the best day of my professional life to be absolutely honest,” Bonham Carter recalls. “I was in complete shock.”

“She’s very brave,” says her co-star, Johnny Depp. “I mean, without question, that’s the toughest part in the movie and she beautifully made it her own. She made Mrs. Lovett kind of vulnerable and horrific and funny and sweet. There’s a lot of angles on that woman that Helena brought to her.”

Now showing across the Philippines, “Sweeney Todd” is distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company.