Regards,
Peter H.

You’re in luck: During the LA leg of their travelling show in 1982, they videotaped a live performance of Sweeny Todd. I highly recommend it.

Lou Cariou had already been replaced by George Hearn, but otherwise it’s the original cast.

It’s a testament to Lansbury’s strength that when Burton did his cinematic version, he advised Bonham-Carter to just play the role understated. He said in interviews that you just couldn’t out-do Lansbury and that the play should really have just been called "Mrs. Lovett."

Best wishes,
-MFS

I remember once meeting a guy who worked on “Murder, She Wrote.”

“My mom loves that show,” I said.

“Everyone’s mom loves that show.” he replied.

The role of Mrs. Lovett was clearly customized for Angela Lansbury’s strengths. Listen to Lansbury working through the unbelievably long phrases to “The Worst Pies In London” – that piece had to have been written specifically for her. An interesting angle is that the Mrs. Lovett character is simultaneously sinister and cloyingly domestic – a fusion of the two themes in Mrs. Lansbury’s career.

So far as I know, her performance was never filmed. A shame.

She came to MGM about the same time as Miss Deborah Kerr.

Miss Kerr wanted to break from the prim-and-proper roles; hence, the iconic From Here To Eternity. Miss Lansbury wanted to go in the opposite direction, from vamp to lovable aunty.

Both ladies succeeded magnificently.

Angela Lansbury was born to act and she has stayed on the screen and stage throughout her adult life cycle. That was not uncommon among the actors who tended to business and let “greater causes” be handled by others.

Jack Paar once tried to get his guest Peter Lorre to talk about studying with Freud. Lorre decisively informed Paar that an actor’s audience did not want anything to intrude upon the role he was playing. Very smart. And very Freudian.

Angela Lansbury, like Peggy Wood, Mary Martin, Ethel Merman, and even Bette Davis has kept he craft from being corrupted by her blathering political opinions. There is a lesson there.

There was a YouTube submission of Ms. Lansbury singing "Not While I’m Around" from Sweeny Todd at a benefit concert after 9/11. Take-some-time-to-calm-the-kids-down sort of thing. But, they appear to have taken it down. It was beautiful and backed by a children’s choir.

But of course, in the play the song was a cover for Mrs. Lovett to soothe little Toby before she turned him over to Todd…

Oh, well. it was a really challenging role and I loved her for it.

Best wishes,
-MFS