Broadway Math: Sutton Foster As 'Mrs. Lovett' in SWEENEY TODD

You've heard of Boy Math. You've heard of Girl Math. Well, we're here to introduce you to Broadway Math.

Every great artist is a sum of their training, years spent in the rehearsal room, and the skills they pick up along the way. With each new character comes a new set of tricks- emotions, styles of dance, accents, etc.- to be learned to bring a character to seamless life.

Over the years an actor's emotional and physical portfolio only grows deeper, making them more and more adaptable for new projects. No Broadway star in recent memory embodies this spirit more and more than the great Sutton Foster, a two-time Tony winner who will step into the iconic role of Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd this February. 

Playing a range of roles and learning a slew of skills with them (even once attending clown college to pull off Casey Nicholaw's demanding choreography in The Drowsy Chaperone) Sutton has run the gamut when it comes to her career. From leading roles in bright and brassy musicals to lower key work on television in series such as Younger, Sutton has proven her worth as a dynamic and gifted chameleon of stage and screen. 

Below, find our equation of which roles have best prepared this show-stopping star for her upcoming residency in Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler's horror classic. 

Millie Dillmount

Thoroughly Modern Millie (2002)

The world fell in love with Sutton Foster in 2002, when she flexed her leading lady skills to Tony-winning effect in this hit musical comedy, showcasing her abilities as a true triple threat. Staggering audiences with her booming belt and terrific tap skills, Sutton also revealed her gift for comedic timing and physicality, a skill that she has only polished in the years since. Her knack for delivering laughs of all kinds is sure serve her well as she's serving up meat pies as the daft and hilarious baker. 

The Baker's Wife

Into the Woods (2019)

In 2019, Sutton joined a star-studded cast for a West coast production of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine's fractured fairytale at the Hollywood Bowl. Portraying The Baker's Wife, Sutton effortlessly saw her way through one of Sondheim's most challenging scores while bringing humor and heart to the morally dubious housewife. She can take these skills directly over to Fleet Street where she will tackle tunes like the tongue-tying, "Worst Pies in London" while bringing the eminently practical, but not-all-that-she-seems Mrs. Lovett to life. 

Reno Sweeney

Anything Goes (2011)

Though much of Mrs. Lovett's comedic appeal comes from her daft demeanor, the deeper truth of the unassuming baker reveals a truly cunning interior. Sutton picked up this skill portraying the alluring evangelist-turned-chanteuse and part-time schemer Reno Sweeney in the 2011 Broadway revival of Cole Porter's Anything Goes, earning her second Tony in the process. Sweeney and Lovett's truly horrendous cannibal pie scheme won't be the first time Sutton has flexed her gift for the grift on Broadway!

Eponine

Les Miserables (1998)

At the heart of Mrs. Lovett's journey is a lingering affection, or "fondness", for the murderous Sweeney, formerly her tenant Benjamin Barker. Sutton is no stranger to falling in love on Broadway, having portrayed love interests in Thoroughly Modern Millie, Shrek, and The Music Man, but it's her time in the original Broadway production of Les Miserables as the lovesick and forlorn Eponine that will help Mrs. Lovett's unrequited love hit the back row.

Josephine 'Jo' March

Little Women (2005)

If Mrs. Lovett is anything, she's a survivor. Stuggling to keep her head above water as a small business owner in a depressed neighborhood, she resorts to a nauseating, yet eminently practical plan to help keep the lights on when times get hard (and there's a body in need of disposing). Nellie's can-do spirit was also channeled through Sutton as the ahead-of-her-time and do-whatever-it-takes literary heroine Jo March in the musical adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. Albeit in a slightly more palatable manner.