Framed by corrupt magistrate Judge Turpin and obsessed with vengeance, crazed barber Sweeney Todd begins slitting his clients’ throats and baking them into meat pies in a plot to avenge his wife and the lost years of his life. Most recently portrayed by Johnny Depp in Tim Burton’s 2007 film, the knife-wielding hairdresser will be played by Marshall Nannes ’09 and David Ressler ’13, who alternate between the titular role and that of his nemesis Turpin.
“Sweeney Todd” is Nannes’ third Interterm musical; he also starred in last year’s “Evita.” He described Sweeney Todd as “the biggest and most challenging role I’ve played in an Amherst show. [He was] deeply wronged in the past, and is now seeking vengeance, and there are many ways to interpret that. I’m trying to play this character as somewhere between the poles of furiously angry on one end, and calm, confident and brooding on the other.” Although Nannes has found remembering which part to sing when his two characters duet to be problematic, he has enjoyed “playing both sides of the coin, protagonist and nemesis.” Ressler added that the two characters “act in a sort of ‘yin and yang’ fashion.”
Julia Moorman ’11 plays Mrs. Lovett, Todd’s partner in crime who bakes meat pies of questionable content. Although it has been “difficult to put [her]self in the shoes of someone who is actually capable of chopping up bodies and baking them into pies, [she is] having a blast with it.”
Also in the cast are Mark Knapp ’10 and Jeffrey Moro ’13. As Anthony Hope, the young, love-struck sailor, Knapp feels that he is, in many ways, “playing myself, with a British accent.” Moro, on the other hand, as extravagant fraud Adolfo Pirelli, who at one point calls himself “the King of the Barbers,” believes his role completes “‘the is-this-a-good-role-checklist” because he gets “a crazy accent, a death scene and a cape.”
According to Nannes, director A. Scott Parry of the New York City Opera has brought a different perspective to the musical and allowed the cast to overcome some of the limitations of Buckley. “He has devised some unique ways of dealing with the challenges of this show,” he said. “Even Sweeney veterans are going to see something new in Scott’s adaptation.”
Many actors highlighted the musical’s blend of the comedic and dark, morbid and romantic. Moorman finds it “intensely dramatic and heart-wrenchingly sad. It’s also very funny, in a pretty dark way. The music is incredibly beautiful and very complex, and the orchestra sounds fantastic.” Knapp added, “The audience can expect lots of killing and lots of kissing. It’s like ‘American Psycho’ crossed with ‘The Notebook.’ The costumes are also ridiculous. But the real reason anybody should go is to see Ben Vincent ’09 in a fat suit.”
Moro believes that all students should attend, simply because “‘Sweeney Todd’ is the greatest musical ever written. It’s also a musical that is completely unlike any other musical. You’re not going to have to sit through some silly love story or a bunch of glitzy dance numbers. There are no jazz hands in this show; there are no overgrown spandex cats jumping around trash heaps singing about their memories. There’s death. Lots of it. The body count in this show is higher than ‘Hamlet.’ There’s rape, there’s incest, there’s cannibalism — but there’s also a whole lot of genuine human emotions. ‘Sweeney Todd’ is about obsession, but it’s also about redemption and forgiveness. And it’s hysterical. The end of Act One is pretty much the most twistedly funny song ever written for a musical. And it’s all set to music and lyrics that are way smarter than most of us will ever be. Really, it’s harder to think of a reason not to go.”
“Sweeney Todd” will be performed in Buckley Recital Hall in Arms Music Center this Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m. Reserve tickets by emailing concerts@amherst.edu or by calling (413) 542-2195.