Sweeney Todd Official site is up and FULL of music — Page 2

I like Carter.

We're so used to hearing big powerful Lovetts, this is a nice change. On film it's unnecessary to be so big. What if her Lovett is more calculated? What if she starts off demure and gradually becomes the Lovett we've known.

Most Lovetts have always seemed an equal match to Sweeney on stage. Perhaps her Lovett is both scared and adoring of Sweeney.

I won't dismiss her. I hated Travolta when I heard the clips of HAIRSPRAY. Then I saw it...and I loved him. His performance made his singing choices make sense.

---

Updated On: 11/28/07 at 07:48 PM

I really don't think a big over the top/music-hall Lovett wouldn't have worked on screen.


*edit* sorry about the funky wording. In a coherent though: A music-hall Lovett could have worked on screen, but I think with Tim
Burton's vision this was the absolute right direction for Lovett.

Updated On: 11/28/07 at 07:55 PM

I thoroughly enjoy what I've seen/heard of Carter in the film so far. Plus, a lot of her singing choices seem to be connected with the action and mood of the movie, not so much for the listening pleasure of everyone.

---

>Perhaps her Lovett is both scared and adoring of Sweeney.<

Some possible spoilers below...

FOA's statement above is pretty close to the truth. Carter's Lovett is quiet, deadpan and seems a sad lost woman, with only her love for Sweeney driving her actions. As I posted in another thread, the mounting terror in her performance will get under your skin. Her take with the humor is very dry and sardonic, not the outrageousness of other stage Lovetts, but it works in a very different but effective way.

There are very strong visuals to her numbers... real live bugs (or maybe CGI bugs) running around the table with kinetic percussive editing for "Worst Pies," the "Poor Thing" flashback to the masked ball, the dream visuals for "By the Sea," her mesmerizing eyes in "Not While I'm Around," (with a particularly heartbreaking final shot), and "A Little Priest" which is a bit more sly, calculating and bloodthirsty than as broadly played in the stage version.

No, her vocals won't make you forget Lansbury or Lupone, but I do think her Lovett will stick with you when you see the complete film. She's too smart and good an actress to be dismissed so cavalierly here for not belting out the score.

---

She's already won me over in the clips. And I can hear the "lost soul" hollowness, and sadness in her voice. I also think the humor is coming through, and will play really well on a big screen.

I kept thinking from the beginning this would be the hardest role to translate to film. Lansbury's Lovett was rooted in broad British Music Hall. And that theatrical style (or any theatrical style for that matter) would lay an egg on film, particularly with today's audiences. She'd amount to nothing more than a grotesque caricature on film.

It's another "Channing in Dolly" or "Mostel in Fiddler" scenario. It won't play well in a movie.

Helena seems to have risen to the challenge of making Mrs. Lovett real enough to relate to emotionally. From what I can tell (and it's an early assessment), she seems to have walked the line between reality and theatricality beautifully.

---

I absolutely LOVE these clips. Everyone sounds gorgeous. Alan's voice took me a little to get used to but everyone else impressed me right away, especially Carter. Her style of singing these song IMO fits perfectly how she plays the role. Like people have been saying, between her acting and the visuals of the film she will be great. I really love hos true this film is being to the ages and each character. They all sound the perfect age, Johanna and Anthony sound so young and innocent, and Toby of course is a big change but works very well as a realistic child.

A reassuring and very perceptive array of comments. So nice to read measured, thoughtful takes on this interpretation. A film must be a translation, a particular up close and personal version of musical theater that works on its own terms. When something is merely replicated to offer theatrical values "intact"-- i.e.THE PRODUCERS -- the camera can be cruel. SWEENEY is inherently full of "size," which could be wear out its welcome. It needed to be rethought to pull the audience in, make us take the journey in intimate realistic pictures, not stage tableaux. Surely the characters had to be fully re-imagined in human terms, not grand as guignol monsters. That means even the score had to be rethought to a point.

The bottom line for me: the stage show will always exist independent of Burton's take, so let's allow Burton his point of view and stamp. In a way, just as we allowed Prince and Doyle theirs. This material stretches -- actors, directors and audiences.

---

I have mixed feelings about this so far. I really like the kid playing Toby and the girl playing Johanna, she has an amazing voice! I'm still a little undecided on Carter's Lovett...Johnny is ok as Sweeney, I'm hoping the visual effect will be better. I'm still excited to see my favorite musical come to the big screen though :)

---

these orchestrations are magnificent. i love johnny depp -- and im shocked that i do. carter's lovett is going to take getting used to, but after reading all these comments, i can see how her vocals are justified. i'm goin for the ride!

OK. I'm a techno-idiot. I go onto the site. I found the "A Little Priest" audio. But, I haven't found any of the other songs. Where are they?

I had my problems with her on first hearing "Priest" but after a few minutes, I realized what Burton is doing. Onstage, so much projection is required to get across the subtlety of the song, but in the movie, Burton can do the one thing theater can't - the close up. It's only then that I realized, "Of course! This is a conspiracy! It should be a whispered scene on film!"

Depp strikes me as wonderful proto-musical theater material. In many ways, he reminds me of Clive Revill, but he lacks the theater background, so he doesn't yet know instinctually where to put his dynamics. Len Cariou - not the world's greatest singer - knew exactly where to put heat in the delivery based on years onstage. Given time, Depp could easily master this.

As for Carter, I wish the director would take her back into the looping studio and take another run at the songs, perhaps if necessary spoon feed her the dynamics she is missing because othrwise, she give a sound performance and it would be a shame for him to leave her vocal work as the one defect in the movie. She is his wife, forgawdssake.

Again, she seems out of her depth because she hasn't spent years on the stage or being groomed by MGM. Angela Landsbury became who she is now, a goddess, over many decades. By the time she hit Mame, she'd been in the musical biz almost 40 years. AND she had another entire decade as a musical theater goddess before Sweeney.

Let's hope Burton polishes up this one rough edge.

---

I keep thinking about Angela's original performance. The first time I heard it on the original cast recording (when the show opened) I thought she sounded AWFUL... like a Cockney Edith Bunker. She was brilliant though, but her voice was very strange. Don't forget that Angela was DUBBED more often than not back in her MGM musical days. They didn't like her singing voice either. Too strident and "vulgar" for film, even for the "tarts" that she (mostly) played back then.

Still, Angela is the prototype for Mrs. Lovett, and I adore her performance including the singing. But it is an "acquired taste" for the average, non-musically savvy listener. And with a film, you have to look for a much wider audience than just musical-lovers.

What I like mostly about Helena's very simple, more realistic interpretation is that I'm hearing some of these melody lines for the first time. The unusual bending of certain melodic phrases... And the cleverness of Lovett's lyrics is really coming through as well. Helena is letting the material shine, rather than trying to outshine the material. With a lesser work than "Sweeney Todd" this could be a disaster. Thankfully, the work is as solid as they come.

---

Wow! I'm liking this more than I thought I would!

I was excited to see a preview on TV the other night in the middle of one of my shows. My partner said, "Good Lord, Johhny Depp, Tim Burton AND Sweeny Todd?! You must be LOVING this!"

---