Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

In 1846 London, the barber Benjamin Barker returns to the city under the name Sweeney Todd and is joined by the young sailor Anthony. A flashback stitches together Barker’s brutal past: fifteen years earlier a corrupt Judge Turpin condemned him on false charges, driven by lust for Barker’s wife Lucy. Turpin also claimed custody of the couple’s daughter, Johanna, and Barker was sent away to a harsh exile in Australia. Rebuilding his life, Barker vows to reclaim what was stolen and reopens his old shop on Fleet Street, a space that sits above the meat pie shop run by the perceptive and devoted Mrs. Lovett.

From the moment he steps back into business, Barker’s presence unsettles the city, and Lovett—who bears unrequited affection for him—offers him his old straight razors as a grim welcome back. The shop becomes a stage for vengeance, as Barker’s longing for justice sharpens into a dangerous resolve. The two form a ruthless alliance, even as the city’s shadows grow heavier with each passing day. The barber’s return also drags into light a public humiliation of rival barber and snake oil salesman Adolfo Pirelli(/actor/robert-burt), a schemer who recognizes Barker’s true identity and tries to blackmail him. Barker’s lethal response is swift, leaving the shop in a hush of shocked onlookers, while Lovett’s quiet complicity deepens, and she quietly grows more attached to the man she believes could never truly love her back. Todd’s past remains a blade at his side, and Lovett’s loyalty—though born of need and affection—pushes him toward a path where revenge leans into ritual.

As Turpin’s ambition to marry Johanna becomes a direct threat, Anthony bursts in with news of a plan to elope, only to be driven away by Turpin and his loyal bailiff Beadle Bamford. The power struggle intensifies when Todd’s shop becomes a backdrop for murder and deception: he kills Pirelli to silence the extortion, and he and Lovett begin to profit from a macabre new partnership that reshapes their fates and the city’s appetite. Toby Ragg, Pirelli’s vulnerable apprentice whom Lovett has taken in, becomes a wild card in this deadly equation, a boy caught between innocence and the noise of a world that feeds on violence.

With their enterprises flourishing, Lovett dreams of a future where she and Todd can retire together, while the town’s whispers—fueled by the unnamed beggar woman who prowls the streets—begin to close in on them. Anthony, disguising himself as a wig maker, plots to rescue Johanna from the asylum, hoping to hide her in Todd’s shop, while Bamford arrives to investigate the foul smell rising from the chimney. The pair mislead him and kill Bamford, but the danger is far from over. The beggar woman enters the shop, seeking Bamford; Johanna hides in a trunk, and the woman, who recognizes Todd, asks, “> Do I know you?” The tension peaks as Turpin returns, and Todd uses the opportunity to reveal his true identity to Turpin and slip into a deadly confrontation that ends with Turpin’s throat cut and his body dropped into the bakehouse.

Todd then confronts Johanna, initially failing to recognize her, and plans to end the girl’s life as part of his vendetta. A scream from Turpin’s dying grasp on Mrs. Lovett’s dress buys Johanna a chance to escape, and Todd races to the bakehouse to finish what he started. In a devastating twist, he discovers the beggar woman is actually his wife Lucy, exposing Lovett’s life‑spun lie about her death and prompting a cruel reckoning. The oven claims Lovett, and, in a final, fatal line of fate, Toby reappears to end Todd’s terror with a single, devastating strike of his razor, leaving behind the macabre aftermath and a city forever changed by their vows of revenge.

Last Updated: October 03, 2025 at 06:47