ACT FOUR: DESIGNING SWEENEY'S WORLD
Burton's films have always been lauded for their amazing set designs and stylish visuals. The man charged with bringing his vision of 19th century London to life was the two-time Academy Award®-winning production designer Dante Ferretti.
One of the masters in his field, Ferretti first gained international recognition through his work with the late Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini on six films before making his mark in Hollywood, collaborating with Martin Scorsese on several films including "The Age of Innocence," "Gangs of New York" and "The Aviator," with Brian De Palma on "The Black Dahlia" and Neil Jordan on "Interview with the Vampire."
"I've seen Dante's work since the Fellini days and there's just an energy about working with somebody who's worked with Fellini," Burton notes. "It roots you in the fact you're making a movie and not just doing it as a business. He's an artist. You walk by his room and he does his own drawings. There's some real energy to that, and the history and all the stuff he's done, that was exciting to me."
For his part, Ferretti always thought Burton reminded him of Fellini, not least because of Burton's artistic nature, always drawing, always sketching. "I always thought so, I always thought he reminded me of Fellini," says the Italian-born designer. "Because he is so creative, he always makes a little sketch, exactly like Fellini. They are very close to each other."
Burton wasn't interested in creating a historically accurate recreation of 19th century London for "Sweeney Todd." "We decided not to be real hardcore because it is kind of a fable and it's slightly stylized," he explains. He sent Ferretti a DVD of "Son of Frankenstein" as a guide to the look he was after in the movie.
"He said, 'I want to do a London that's a little bit like an old black and white Hollywood movie,'" recalls the production designer. "Not too many details, like black and white in color, just a few colors. It's very graphic. Tim is really creative. He has a very clear idea what he wants. He's a great, great director and if you look at all his movies, the look is one of the most important things."
Adding to the movie's distinct look was the use of brightly colored flashbacks to explain the characters' backstories or fantasies. "The original music and lyrics talk about Sweeney losing his wife and having her tragically taken away by Judge Turpin," says producer MacDonald. "But the movie gave us the opportunity to visualize that, so we actually see who Sweeney was before and how he was forged. These vibrant punches create a sharp contrast to Ferretti's stark design and convey the juxtaposition between who Sweeney was and what he has now become."
Renowned for creating amazing fantasy worlds using traditional filmmaking techniques -- building sets on soundstages and back lots rather than using CGI -- Burton had initially planned to shoot "Sweeney Todd" in the manner of "Sin City" and "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow," using minimal sets and props, and filming his actors against green screens. "Part of the reason was the budget," he explains. "But when I really thought about it, being on a set helps me, it helps the actors, it helps everybody. And at the end of the day, people are singing. And singing on a green screen, you're so far removed from any reality that it would have been a really scary nightmare. I think that made it even more important to have sets on this one, because of the singing."
Producer Zanuck says the difference in cost between building sets and using the green screen method was minimal. "We realized that for substantially the same as doing it digitally, we could, if we did it intelligently with set extension and a little green screen, build sets," he reveals. "And Tim certainly feels much more comfortable and so do the actors."
While Ferretti welcomed the decision to build sets, it would ultimately mean more work for him and his team. Under the initial green screen scheme, the set for Judge Turpin's house was planned to have been little more than a simple window and door shot against a green screen. Swapping to a more traditional method meant building an entire house set, along with a tree-lined street and an enormous painted backdrop. In all, Ferretti designed and supervised the construction of more than a dozen full sets at Pinewood Studios. A shortened pre-production period and a relatively tight budget required much ingenuity on Ferretti's behalf to not only create the large number of sets required by the script, but also build them on the small number of soundstages available to the production at Pinewood. Ferretti's solution was ingenious and remarkably cost effective. By incorporating movable walls and interchangeable storefronts, he designed sets that could be reused, and so the St. Dunstan's Market, which was built on Pinewood's S Stage, transformed very easily into Fleet Street, saving the production both time and money.
"This is our first time with Dante and he's exceeded our expectations," says Zanuck. "We didn't have a lot of money and we couldn't build everything we wanted. He's taken certain sets and made other sets out of them, by just changing the structure. There are sets behind sets because we couldn't afford to have a lot of stages. It's extraordinary what he's done. You're going to feel like you're in London at that time period, and obviously we have set extensions that are done digitally so you'll get the feeling that it's a big outdoor picture."
"There's something miraculous when, as a writer, you write INT. PIE SHOP and then you see what Dante and Tim have created," explains screenwriter Logan. "I know Dante very well because he did 'The Aviator' and I knew he would bring his fine love of detail to this world. In the screenplay, I said the barber shop looked haunted and that's what every square inch of this world looks like. They are very unsettling sets to walk through because they're dark and they have strange broken angles and you never quite know what might come round a corner, whether it's Sweeney Todd with a razor, Mrs. Lovett with a pie or Jack the Ripper. They're frightening sets, which is appropriate because it's a horror movie."
For the actors, the detail in Ferretti's work was nothing short of inspiring. "I loved the sets," says Bonham Carter. "I loved walking onto Fleet Street. The atmosphere helps you considerably if your environment invites your imagination to travel. And I loved my shop."
Another crucial element for the actors was Colleen Atwood's wardrobe because "the costumes are another character in the movie," Burton explains. "I've worked with Colleen many, many times, and she gets that. She's as important as any designer in terms of helping the tone of the whole piece. Her costumes help the actors find who the character is and that helps their performances."
The job on "Sweeney Todd" was particularly challenging because of the limited color palette used for all the present-day scenes, but by playing with various textures and styles Atwood achieved the feel Burton was seeking. "Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett are strong," he says. "When you see a picture of the old Frankenstein or Dracula, or any classic movie monster, you want to have that kind of strength of image. And so that was always the goal: if you ever saw the two of them it would create a new version of those images."
In keeping with that sensibility, Burton wanted "Sweeney Todd" to look almost like a black and white film, devoid of virtually all color. "The first idea was to make the film as close to black and white as possible," explains director of photography Dariusz Wolski. "Tim showed me a lot of old horror films. We both like film noir. We like old black and white movies. So that was the general approach, to make it very moody, very dark, a lot of contrast, very graphic. Dante built sets that were very monochromatic, very stark. Then I came in with the lighting. We looked at a lot of photographs of Old London. We tried to make the film look like an old movie with contemporary technology and a modern way of making an old-fashioned film."
Later, in post-production, the Polish-born cinematographer used a Digital Intermediate process to strip out even more color. "What we're doing in this film is a combination of make-up, wardrobe, set design and me treating the film, pulling the color out," Wolski explains. "We're trying to make this movie almost black and white, except for some faded colors here and there. And blood."
Given that Sweeney's method of murder is cutthroat, it was inevitable that "Sweeney Todd" would be awash with blood, although Burton's film is, of course, following in the footsteps of the stage production. "The first time Tim and I met, the first thing we talked about was when we first saw 'Sweeney Todd' and how much we remember the blood," notes Logan. "At the first throat-slitting, the razor goes wide, the blood arched across the stage, the light hit it and it was this unique red.
"In reality when you slit someone's throat it is a messy business and we don't shy away from that," Logan continues. "We are in no way coy about what Sweeney Todd is doing because to understand the tragedy of Sweeney you have to understand the degradation which he inflicts on himself and other people. You have to understand he is, in fact, a homicidal maniac and yet your heart breaks for him. That is the genius of 'Sweeney Todd,' and we thought it was very important not to shy away from the reality of the blood. So when he slits a throat arterial blood sprays and people are coated with it."
"Tim was reared on horror movies," laughs Bonham Carter, "that was his treat every Saturday night and Johnny loves them too. And they've definitely looked back at their old favorites for a lot of inspiration. It is a horror movie. But Tim's quite mischievous. There's a lot of schlock, which he finds incredibly funny, and a lot of gore, which again he finds incredibly funny. There's a lot of black humor in it. And hopefully it'll be scary but at the same time it will be very funny, I hope, in a perverse way and very entertaining."
"'Sweeney Todd' is, in the classical dramatic sense, a blood tragedy," concludes Logan. "Obviously it plays homage to Grand Guignol, it plays homage to the 'Penny Dreadfuls' of Victorian London. But it's important to say that the blood in 'Sweeney Todd' is not sadistic, it is not unnecessary; it is absolutely a part of the world that these characters inhabit, so to shy away from it would be dishonest and coy in a way this story is not and this filmmaker is not. The truth of this is, people are being killed, this central character is motivated with so much desire and passion that he has to kill people with his hands and their blood gets on his hands and on his face, and he is coated with it figuratively and literally."

EPILOGUE: FIRST SCREENING
The first audiences to be treated to a view of "Sweeney Todd," were at the Venice Film Festival in September where Burton was awarded the Golden Lion for career achievement. Eight minutes of the film were unveiled, including Depp singing the song "My Friends." The reaction to the footage was excellent and wildly enthusiastic.
"I pray it's going to be at least half as enjoyable and exciting and thrilling as making it has been," says Bonham Carter. "It should be great. It's a true marriage of Sondheim and Tim, because they've both got very similar sensibilities and the same black humor. And the romance of the music also, and the tenderness too, because both Tim and Johnny are both very tender."
"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. "I'm trying to be as pure to it as possible, but I don't know how the purists will respond to it, but then again, how many purists are there? 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, 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."
"I'm most excited about the people who have never heard of Stephen Sondheim, who have never been to a Broadway show in their life, who are going to get to see this majestic piece of work," says Logan. "They're going to get to hear a score unlike anything that has ever been composed by an American composer. They're going to get to see a story that is unique, that they don't know. And they're going to get to understand why we, who love 'Sweeney Todd,' have loved it for so long and so passionately. In a way, they will get to be John Logan or Tim Burton watching this for the first time and being inspired with a passion that has lasted now 25 years. At its heart, 'Sweeney Todd' is a horror musical. It is a horror movie with music that supports it. It is also, I think, a riveting character drama and a wonderful black comedy. It is an exercise in Guignol. But above everything else, it is pure entertainment. It is the genius of Stephen Sondheim, the genius of Tim Burton, the world of Sweeney Todd, coming together to create something unique and very entertaining."

THE LEGEND OF SWEENEY TODD
"Walking into this production I said to the studio, 'You know, guys, there's going to be a lot of blood in this movie,'" recalls director Tim Burton, who clearly understood that such a twisted tale needed to be as packed with gore as one of Mrs. Lovett's infamous pies; after all, Sweeney Todd was a truly horrific figure.
Though some claim he never existed, others have documented a concise history of the 18th century's legendary "Demon Barber" of Fleet Street. To the tabloid press who adopted him, the "Penny Dreadfuls" that exploited him and the theatrical stage, which immortalized him, "Sweeney Todd" is proof positive of the maxim (acknowledgments to John Ford's "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance") "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."
Sweeney Todd was reputedly born in 1748, the only child of poor, alcoholic silk workers. At that time London was plagued by disease, pollution, poverty and corruption, and young Todd grew up working alongside his parents in the clothing mills. His mother and father disappeared under mysterious circumstances and, at age 14, Todd was arrested for a petty robbery and sent to Newgate Prison; this was actually considered merciful, as most child thieves were hung for their crimes.
Living among killers and crooks, Todd allegedly became the apprentice of a prison barber and fellow-convict, Elmer Plummer. Since barbers also performed certain surgical duties (hence the origin of the blood-red stripe on a barber pole), Todd learned his trade, aspects of anatomy, and how to pick the pockets of his reclining customers. These skills served him well upon release, but greed, jealousy and unbridled anger overtook the young man and his killing spree began.
Todd soon opened up shop at 186 Fleet Street next to St. Dunstan's Church, beneath which lay forgotten tunnels and catacombs holding dead parishioners. Todd advertised his services by displaying jars of teeth, hair, and blood in the window, while in the center of the room lay his most ingenious and sinister device of all: the barber chair.
To disguise his crimes, Todd reportedly created a trap door that swung a full 360 degrees. He attached a barber chair on each side, so that when a lever was pulled the customer's weight caused the occupied chair to flip upside down, dropping the victim onto his head in the basement many floors below. As the panel continued its rotation, leaving an empty barber chair in its place, Todd would race down into the basement. If the fall hadn't killed the customer, he used his razor to finish the job. Todd then stripped the body of all valuables and hid it amongst the ancient corpses under St. Dunstan's. This plan worked for a while, but as the killings continued, Todd started to run out of places to hide his victims.
Meanwhile, Todd met the money-hungry widow Margery Lovett. The two became lovers and partners-in-crime after Todd set up Mrs. Lovett's pie shop in Bell Yard, which was connected to his barbershop via the underground tunnels. Todd used his surgical skills to butcher the bodies, delivering the meat to Mrs. Lovett for her pies while hiding the skin and bones in the church catacombs.
As Todd's bloodlust flourished and Mrs. Lovett's pie business boomed, a foul stench rose up from the bowels of St. Dunstan's. Authorities investigated and it didn't take long to connect a string of missing men with piles of rotting corpses and a trail of bloody footprints leading from under Todd's business over to Mrs. Lovett's. That's when the public hysteria began.

THE MEDIA AND PENNY DREADFULS
Todd was arrested without incident, but when authorities arrived at Bell Yard for Mrs. Lovett, her pie-eating customers learned both about the murders and that they had consumed some of the victims. The crowd tried lynching her on the spot, but Lovett was quickly taken to Newgate Prison. She confessed to her and Todd's dark dealings before committing suicide, while Todd was granted a trial, found guilty, and eventually hung; all told, Sweeney Todd is believed to have murdered over 160 people.
The public voraciously followed these larger-than-life events, and newspaper publishers took advantage of this sudden interest to increase their print sales. Reporters combined rumors with facts, sensationalizing the story in such a way that Sweeney Todd soon became prime tabloid fodder and the stuff of urban legend; indeed, it's because of these numerous retellings that there are no accurate descriptions of Todd's actual appearance.
The obvious popularity of these real-crime stories, combined with a growing number of reading adults, inspired the creation of penny part magazines, so named because they contained serialized tales sold for one cent. Due to their graphic subject matter and as a comment on the writing quality, they soon became known as Penny Bloods, and later Penny Dreadfuls. The most popular of these Penny Dreadfuls was Thomas Peckett Prest's 1846 story entitled "The String of Pearls," featuring a Demon Barber named Sweeney Todd. Between Prest's story and Todd's history within popular culture, it wasn't long before this blood-soaked tale was adapted for the stage.

THE GRAND GUIGNOL TRADITION
"George Dibdin-Pitt was one of the most popular playwrights of his day," explains Stephen Sondheim. "He made Sweeney Todd into a play in the late 1840s and it became a big hit." While the story certainly spoke to the public's fascination with horror and the macabre, Pitt's Sweeney Todd also amazed audiences by styling itself like a French Grand Guignol melodrama.
Named after Le Theatre du Grand Guignol, which was founded by Oscar Metenier in 1897, Grand Guignol plays are known for their grisly stories and lavish special effects. Now considered a quaint form of entertainment that became obsolete with the success of horror movies in the 1960s, at the time of Pitt's Sweeney Todd production it was a stunning sight for audiences. That success inspired numerous other adaptations over the years, but it wasn't until the early 1970s that playwright and actor Christopher Bond wrote a version with significant changes. Bond inserted the Judge Turpin revenge plot, transforming Sweeney Todd from a simple thieving serial killer into a complex, haunted man.
"In 1973 I was in London and that's the version I saw," Sondheim says. "I've always been very fond of melodrama and I just thought this play would make a really good musical. So I asked Christopher Bond permission and then I wrote the musical."


THE CREATIVE TEAM: TIM BURTON/ JOHN LOGAN/ STEPHEN SONDHEIM

SONDHEIM DISMEMBERS 'SWEENEY'

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