Sweeny Todd Debacle

[Chason]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 2:59am

I'm sorry - don't lay into me! I think it's VERY important! I replied to a Sweeny Todd post... and now I'm worried that it won't be seen! It should be seen by EVERYONE! EVERY person on this board should be FIRED UP! If we let this happen to the Sweeny Todd film - then it will happen to a LOT of musicals transfered to film! Tim Burton thinks (and clearly the studio backs him up) that he can just totally RE-THINK Sweeny Todd! Do you think that's okay? I'm hearing (nothing factual, mind you) that the film is only 90 minutes and has LOTS of dialogue. I've never SEEN Sweeny Todd on STAGE, but from what I've HEARD - on stage it is about 2 3/4 hours and has very LITTLE dialogue!
Straighten me out if you can. I think it's the beginning of the end. Musicals on stage turned into something QUITE less once they reach the BIG SCREEN! I'm a Tim Burton fan, but he's about to piss me off big time with his take on Sweeny Todd. What are you thinking about it all? I'm VERY curious.
ORIGINAL POST:
What are we even TALKING about here? I've already heard that the FILM is 90 minutes or so (CLEARLY cut WAY back from the original 2 3/4 hour of the play). I hope I'm WRONG - but this MAY be the case in which we have to REJECT what the "studio" is willing to GIVE us! Let's not just give them the "okay" to take a great musical and turn into something "amazingly visual", while they CUT OUT a LOT of the music! Please JOIN ME in REFUSING that film musicals (based on Broadway versions) need to be cut-down and mainstreamed for some kind of IDIOT audience that the studios apparantly feel is TOO musical (Sweeney Todd is almost ALL music). OMG - I SWEAR to God - if they start making musical plays into films that (regardless of how elaboratly filmed) are cutting out the MUSIC part of it - I'm so TOTALLY out of here! They ALREADY cut out songs, no doubt - just look at some of the past ones. Are you guys seriously going to sit here and let this happen? I don't even know where to start voicing my complaints! Sweeny Todd is pretty much finished - so I guess there's nothing we can do about it! I'll ask those who have SEEN the show on STAGE... HOW, exactly do you feel about a MOVIE version that is CLAIMING to be BASED on the MUSICAL.... yet, reduces the screen time by about an hour (maybe more), and turns a LOT of the originally SUNG dialogue into SPOKEN dialogue? DAMNIT!
What are we even TALKING about here? I've already heard that the FILM is 90 minutes or so (CLEARLY cut WAY back from the original 2 3/4 hour of the play). I hope I'm WRONG - but this MAY be the case in which we have to REJECT what the "studio" is willing to GIVE us! Let's not just give them the "okay" to take a great musical and turn into something "amazingly visual", while they CUT OUT a LOT of the music! Please JOIN ME in REFUSING that film musicals (based on Broadway versions) need to be cut-down and mainstreamed for some kind of IDIOT audience that the studios apparantly feel is TOO musical (Sweeney Todd is almost ALL music). OMG - I SWEAR to God - if they start making musical plays into films that (regardless of how elaboratly filmed) are cutting out the MUSIC part of it - I'm so TOTALLY out of here! They ALREADY cut out songs, no doubt - just look at some of the past ones. Are you guys seriously going to sit here and let this happen? I don't even know where to start voicing my complaints! Sweeny Todd is pretty much finished - so I guess there's nothing we can do about it! I'll ask those who have SEEN the show on STAGE... HOW, exactly do you feel about a MOVIE version that is CLAIMING to be BASED on the MUSICAL.... yet, reduces the screen time by about an hour (maybe more), and turns a LOT of the originally SUNG dialogue into SPOKEN dialogue? DAMNIT!

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:01am

. . .

Oh, yes -- save us from the plague of artistic re-interpretation!

Updated On: 10/20/07 at 03:01 AM

[FranzRelax]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:02am

Your typing style makes it VERY hard to read or comprehend anything you're attempting to say.

[FranzRelax]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:02am

Also if you pay attention, the word going around is that the Sweeney film is going to be very faithful to the stage version. A LOT of the score is going to be there. Heck even "Wait" is going to be in the movie!

Updated On: 10/20/07 at 03:02 AM

[Peronista]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:12am

I, for one, appreciate your passion. But of course the film has yet to be seen so, you may be pleasantly surprised. In the mean time, maybe filmakers (studios) will realize that many of the shows-to-films trying to remove much of the score and speak lyrics that were originally sung are less successful critically as well as at the box office, as opposed to perhaps something like Hairspray (which unapologetically opened with song and stuck to the accepted traditions of musicals throughout). Sooner or later they'll probably get the message that trusting the audience isn't so risky.
peronista, up far too late...

[rosscoe(au)]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:15am

So you based all of this on what, a rumour?

No one has seen the finished film, so are you basing this on 4 minutes of footage. I mean really did you think the whole thing was going to be sung thru?

Maybe you could bring this up after the movie is released, but really this film was never made for die hard fans and anyone who thinks it is, is deluding themselves

[Chason]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:28am

"...but really this film was never made for die hard fans and anyone who thinks it is, is deluding themselves"

Well then that just SUCKS! I'm not a Die-Hard fan - but I'd like to SEE for myself what it it "was/is" all about! I think that BOTH film versions of RENT and THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA gave movie audiences EXACTLY what the stage versions were about. They pretty much STUCK TO THE SCRIPT! For God's sake - at least let ME make the decision! I guess it's just too "risky" anymore (God forbid should we let some teenage BOY be dissapointed!) I'm not far FROM a teenage boy. Dear Lord - PLEASE let me see FAITHFUL movie versions of Broadway musicals!

[Chason]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:34am

"Also if you pay attention, the word going around is that the Sweeney film is going to be very faithful to the stage version. A LOT of the score is going to be there. Heck even "Wait" is going to be in the movie!"

FRANZ: I don't understand WHY you're having trouble reading my post - unless you can't read English. I wouldn't have STARTED this post if I weren't "paying attention". Maybe YOU should. Tim Burton's Sweeny Todd could HARDLY be faithful to the stage version. I won't point out WHY - because I said ALL of that in my original post. I could go on, but I choose not to. I'm sure you're a very nice person, etc.

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:40am

It's HARD to read what YOU'RE talking about WHEN you randomly capitalize STUFF and don't do paragraph BREAKS.

[Chason]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:48am

"It's HARD to read what YOU'RE talking about WHEN you randomly capitalize STUFF and don't do paragraph BREAKS".

I DO take paragraph breaks - and since I don't know how to do "italics" on here, I just CAP whatever words I think need to be emphisised. I think sometimes that I should EMPHASISE sometimes that YOU need to be T I C K L E D !!!
But PLEASE (if you can get through what you must think I've written in CRAYOLA) respond to the facts that I've written in my post! (Tickles to follow).

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 3:52am

Lizzie just throws up if you tickle her.



And she has great aim.

[rosscoe(au)]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 4:04am

Well look at how great Rent and Phantom turned out to be( at least phantom was watchable, unlike that piece of crap, way too old, horribly cast version of Rent )

And i still don't get why you are up in arms over a film YOU have yet to see! F*CK no one has seen it yet, but you are upset!( go watch the DVD, take a pick there are two of them )

Honey take a pill, have a nice cup of tea and a lie down and we WILL talk after the film is released.

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 4:06am

I'm hearing (nothing factual, mind you) that the film is only 90 minutes and has LOTS of dialogue. I've never SEEN Sweeny Todd on STAGE, but from what I've HEARD - on stage it is about 2 3/4 hours and has very LITTLE dialogue!

Wait. You have NEVER seen the show??? It has been taped on stage and that is out on DVD. RENT IT! It runs 147 minutes (including credits.) And it is about 75% sung. There is a lot of spoken dialogue in it as well.

As for rumors of the running time, we won't know for sure until it gets released by the estimate as that it would be 1:45. So yes, that will be about 35-40 minutes shorter than the stage show but film is a different medium and can communicate more visually. Even the best film versions of stage musicals (WEST SIDE STORY, SOUND OF MUSIC, PAJAMA GAME) did make changes to the source material.


Musicals on stage turned into something QUITE less once they reach the BIG SCREEN!

Hello? Hollywood has been doing this for years. In the early 1930s they would buy a hit musicals (GOOD NEWS, ANYTHING GOES) junk most of the score, replace with new songs by studio hacks, and rewrite the stories.

It wasn't until the 1950s that we started getting reasonably faithful screen adaptations. By the 1960s many film were so slavishly faithful that they seemed embalmed.

Want an example where a film completely reconceptualized a stage piece and made it into something even better? Look at the film version of CABARET. It's NOT the CABERET we see on stage but as a film it's brilliant.

Wait until the film comes out and then do your rant. Oh, and be sure of your facts before you do.

[rosscoe(au)]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 7:33am

"This year, DreamWorks can afford to lay low on Tim Burton's "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street," because the R-rated Stephen Sondheim musical has a strong curiosity factor going for it. The movie, which opens on 1,200 screens Dec. 21, stars Johnny Depp, who has been nominated twice and never won. DreamWorks will start running "for your consideration" trade ads after the movie has been screened in early December; DVDs will be mailed in December."


So there you go the film will not be screened anywhere till early December.

[dramarama2]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 7:59am

Your post is too long and to be honest I can't be bothered to read it.

[frogs_fan85]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 8:13am

From what I can remember of the recent revival it ran somewhere between 2:20 and 2:30. So if you take out the intermission and the bows you're down to 2 hours even or 2:10. I remember reading that Johanna was turned into a non-singing role so that eliminates "Green Finch and Linnet Bird", which is around 4-5 minutes. I'm sure that they cut down "A Little Priest" from the nearly 7-8 minutes that it is. I can also easily see Burton having cut "Parlour Song", "Ladies in Their Sensitivities" and the reprises of "The Ballad of Sweeney Todd". If you can up all of these songs and a few cuts to some of the dialogue, I'd imagine the end result would be somewhere around 90 minutes. I don't really consider this to be a travesty.

EDIT- To correct the sentence about Johanna. Updated On: 10/20/07 at 08:13 AM

[MovieDan82]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 8:26am

The Washington Post is reporting this morning that the film is now 160 minutes.

[Gypsy9]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 8:46am

You have to get used to the fact that movies of Broadway musicals are not going to be the same thing. In my case, I was so disappointed in the film version of my favorite show GYPSY, starring the mis-cast Rosalind Russell, that I refuse to watch it. For me, it was a travesty. The Bette Midler version is decent, with production details--like the vaudeville routines-- very much like the stage musical. Since there is a DVD of SWEENEY TODD as a stage musical you should get that version and just not worry about the Hollywood version.

[TabooPhan1]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 8:46am

"I think that BOTH film versions of RENT and THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA gave movie audiences EXACTLY what the stage versions were about. They pretty much STUCK TO THE SCRIPT!"

I've been a die-hard Phantom fan since I was twelve, and I was appalled by the monstrocity they produced. The Phantom and Raul got in a sword fight... enough said.

I would say, don't start getting freaked out until you see it. And if you're worried about ruining it for yourself, perhaps you should take advantage of the numerous resources out there and watch a performance (George Hearn and Angela Lansbury, George Hearn and Patti Lupone- although it's a concert version with some staging), then go see the movie. I know it's easy to get freaked out, but I can't really understand why you would be so upset if you've never seen the show, and you have admittedly not made any effort to see any version (live or not) of the show... Do your homework, THEN give an opinion...

[Rotel1026]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 8:50am

The most faithful stage to screen adaptation recently was probably The Producers and that thing sucked. Rent and Phantom didn't quite light the box office on fire either so what does Hollywood have to go on that tells them people want faithful reproductions?

Most all musicals when they make the move to the screen get changed a bit. It's not the end of the world, just breathe and wait until it actually comes to theaters to get all up in arms over it.

Also, Sweeney Todd has several DVDs out with great casts. You should consider watching them. Also, the Doyle production will be touring through Dallas (I believe that's where you live?) in January, maybe consider watching that as well.

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 9:01am

The film runs a little under two hours, last I heard.

Frogsfan is correct with his time approximations.

The stage version runs 2:30, with intermission. Cut out those 15 minutes, and it's down at 2:15. Cut out bows, etc, 2:10. Most of the songs are there, though shortened. About two or three, I've heard, are completely excessed. Round it out. 2 hours, maybe 1:50.


I don't understand the point of the first post. Hmm.

[best12bars]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 9:04am

It's funny how several of the shows being mentioned (Cabaret, Rent, Phantom, etc.) were all adaptations themselves, starting with the thread subject Sweeney Todd. I don't understand the "purist" approach to something that was adapted and modified from the Christopher Bond play, which was in turn adapted from many melodramas and Penny Dreadfuls that came before it, going all the way back to the original oral "legend" stories that circulated around London in the 1700s. You would do better to think of this as yet another adaptation of the Sweeney story, based on the Broadway musical by Sondheim & Wheeler.

It's not archival, and it's not a documentary of the stage show. And since we already have the Lansbury/Hearn taping, there would be little point in approaching it that way. If you want to see the stage show, then by all means... SEE THE STAGE SHOW (emphasized with caps).

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 9:10am

Let's have a bit of comparison:

CABARET, a brilliant movie, is very different from the stage musical, in fact, an entire plot line is gone.

RENT and PHANTOM, both stayed "close" to the original and sucked (and RENT, at least, did pretty poorly at the box office).

Which would you prefer?

[James885]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 9:29am

I agree with what best12bars said. There would be little point in making the movie if Burton wasn't going to re-imagine it in some way. Like he said, if you want to see the stage show on screen, just rent the Lansbury-Hearn DVD. But I think it's silly to think that the movie musical is going be excactly like the stage show. Of course songs are going to be cut for the film. Of course some lyrics might be changed, or some scenes cut and new scenes possibly added. That's why it's called a film ADAPTATION.

Like someone already said, The Producers was extremely faithful to the stage show (to the point where all the dialogue was almost verbatim from the book of the show) and we know how well that did. Rent and Phantom were both faithful to their respective shows and both tanked critically and at the box office.

Updated On: 10/20/07 at 09:29 AM

[westcoast_wannabe]

Posted: 10/20/07 at 9:47am

**Tim Burton thinks (and clearly the studio backs him up) that he can just totally RE-THINK Sweeny Todd!**

Just like Rob Marshal and Bob Fosse did with Chicago and Cabaret. It is possible to re-conceptualize a show and produce a brilliant film adaptation. So just because some songs may be cut or the running times shorter, there’s no reason to fear that the show has been butchered. There’s no way to judge Tim Burton interpretation aside from seeing the finished product.