On a cold, drizzly day (somewhat
suitable, one might say) at the Claridge's Hotel, there was a feeling of
excitement in the air that you could cut with a knife as the cast and creative team of the highly-anticipated new movie-musical Sweeney Todd crowded a press junket in London.
In a very special BroadwayWorld exclusive, London reporter Nick Hutson provides a very special Q/A series with the likes of Johnny Depp, renown composer Stephen Sondheim; plus stars Alan Rickman, Helena Bonham Carter, and director Tim Burton and the stars
of tomorrow Ed Sanders, Jayne Weisner and Jamie Campbell Bower.
Stay Tuned as BroadwayWorld brings you even more exclusive content and features on Sweeney Todd! In theatres for limited national release December 21, 2007 and wide
January 11, 2008.
STEPHEN SONDHEIM (COMPOSER/LYRICIST)
For me to be in the presence of Stephen Sondheim was a dream
come true. As always, he is incredibly
articulate and spoke very highly of his colleagues. He provided us with a brief background of how
the film production came to be…
Stephen Sondheim:
Movie musicals have not been very popular up until recently when a couple of
them have suddenly broken through like Chicago…
and Sweeney was not the big hit that
made movie studios clamber for it. It lost half its investment on Broadway, and
it's only after a period of time that it's become more popular with
revivals. It was a big flop in London… London
critics hated it, which is ironic because it was my love letter to England. The
first person to ask to do it was in fact Tim Burton about 20 years ago. He came to see me and said he wanted to do it
as a musical and I said "wonderful." We had a nice conversation, and I never
heard from him again. He got, as we say, interested in other projects. And then a few years ago Sam Mendes did a
production of Gypsy in New York City
and we were having coffee during the recording session and Sam said "Have
you ever thought of Sweeney Todd as a
movie?" and I said "Well, Tim Burton once came to me," but otherwise
nobody has ever approached me about it," He said "I'd like to do it"
and I said "Great! Let's do it." He
got hold of John Logan, the screenwriter, and they started to work it out
together and then Sam got frustrated by casting – the people he wanted to cast,
for some reason or another, didn't come through and so after a couple of years
Sam said "I give up." I don't know
exactly who it was who brought it to Tim and said "are you still
interested?" – Anyway Tim obviously said "yes," and that's what
happened.
Obviously, the most
important man behind any film is the director – and Sondheim was asked what he
finds important in a director for his work:
