Not to put to fine a point on the ages of the actors vis a vis the characters: the life expectancy for a European woman in 1850s was 42, 40 for men. A half a century later, by 1900, it was only 50. In her late 30s, Mrs. Lovett was decidedly a woman of "limited wind." And jump ahead a century: we boomers remember when a Broadway play starring Julie Harris called Forty Carats was about a "middle-aged woman" finding love again. At 40. A desperate 38ish Nellie Lovett, surrounded by disease, famine, poverty, portrays historically accurate desperation. Her chances of remarriage: nil.
"I'm a comedian, but in my spare time, things bother me." Garry Shandling