There's a peculiar kind of alchemy happening on Broadway these days. A potent concoction of blood, revenge, and meat pies, simmering away under the harsh glare of social media. It shouldn't work, not really. And yet, here we are, swept away by the phenomenon that is Sweeney Todd, revived with a ferocity I haven't witnessed in years.
The buzz, of course, centers around Josh Groban. An unlikely Sweeney, some scoffed. Too clean-cut, too...earnest for a vengeful barber. But that's precisely where this production, helmed with a stark vision by Thomas Kail, finds its footing. Groban's Sweeney isn't consumed by rage from the outset. He's a man hollowed out, a husk left adrift by injustice. And when the rage does come, it's terrifying in its precision, a scalpel rather than a cleaver.
Remember that production of Hamlet, years ago, with the film star? Everyone expected fireworks, a kind of emotional pyrotechnics. Instead, we got a muted, internal performance. Devastating in its quiet intensity. Groban's Sweeney operates in a similar register. The fury simmers beneath the surface, threatening to boil over in every tightly controlled word and gesture.
And then there's Annaleigh Ashford. Let's be honest, Mrs. Lovett has always been the show's secret weapon. A role tailor-made for scene-stealing, for a certain kind of theatrical wink. But Ashford, she understands the darkness at the heart of Lovett. The desperation that fuels her macabre enterprise. She's funny, yes, but it's a humor edged with something unsettling. A kind of manic energy that speaks volumes about the world they inhabit.
Because that's the thing about this revival. It taps into something very current, very raw. The set, a decaying industrial wasteland, could be a forgotten corner of any American city. The costumes, a mix of grunge and grime, wouldn't look out of place in a dive bar on the Lower East Side. This isn't your grandmother's Sweeney Todd, all Victorian gloom and gothic melodrama. It's a Sweeney Todd for the Instagram age, where despair is a meme and outrage is just a click away.
And the music. Sondheim's score, always brilliant, feels positively dangerous here. The orchestra, perched precariously above the stage, attacks the music with a ferocity that borders on the unhinged. It's as if the score itself is another character, a Greek chorus commenting on the unfolding tragedy.
There's a moment, near the end, that's seared into my memory. Sweeney, covered in blood, stands amidst the carnage he's created. The stage is bathed in an unforgiving red light. And for a moment, just a moment, Groban looks directly at the audience. It's a look of pure, unadulterated despair. A recognition of the abyss he's fallen into. And in that moment, the fourth wall crumbles. We're not just watching a play anymore. We're complicit in the horror.
This is what great theater does. It holds a mirror up to our own darkest impulses. It forces us to confront the ugliness that lurks beneath the surface. And in doing so, it reminds us of our shared humanity. Even in the midst of the grotesque, there's a strange kind of beauty. A reminder that even in the darkest of times, art can still shock, can still move, can still provoke.
This Sweeney Todd isn't just a revival. It's a reckoning. A testament to the enduring power of theater to unsettle, to challenge, to endure. Go see it. But be warned: you might not recognize yourself in the reflection.
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