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The final image of David Freeman's concert staging of Sondheim and Wheeler's Sweeney Todd at the Royal Festival Hall has the entire company eyeball the audience and draw razors across their throats. We could all be Sweeney, they would seem to be saying. What's your moral compass? It's a chilling touch. And the evening provides a few of those: like what dear Nellie Lovett, Sweeney's ever hopeful helpmate, might do with a hostess trolley, a hacksaw, and a handful of bin liners. As Sweeney says to the Beadle: "I am, Sir, entirely at your disposal."
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He barely noticed Mrs. Lovett the entire evening – except, of course, when he needed her. And Maria Friedman, emerging from her shroud like a superannuated Minnie Mouse in a red polka-dot frock, was hard to miss. What a smashing performance this was and how good it would be to see it develop in the theatre. Whether stomping on bugs, bagging body parts, or drooling over Mr Todd, Friedman deployed her best Barbara Windsor-cum-Marie Lloyd belter voice with attitude. The miking might have helped her a little more, but she and Sweeney's music hall turn 'Have a Little Priest' – a grisly catalogue of who exactly they might pop into their pies – certainly hit the spot.
So did other performances: Daniel Evans's terrifically vital and verbally dextrous Tobias, Adrian Thompson's cartoonish Pirelli, Daniel Boys' sweetly sung Anthony, and Philip Quast's odious Judge Turpin. That first moment when Sweeney has him in the chair, relishing the prospect of slicing through his jugular, was played out here in sensuous and suspenseful slow motion. And yes, it was scary just how much we shared in Sweeney's pleasure.
© Independent News & Media (UK) Ltd.
