Erika Bailey

Sweeney Todd cradles in its hands a tiny secret that can change the world. To those that

watch its violent, murderous story, it is a hammer that shatters societal norms of what it means to

be evil, soulless, and obsessive. Sweeney revealed that every single person is capable of allowing

obsession to consume them and push them into committing murder.

Toby, the most innocent character, cannot be shielded from the cruelness of his

environment, proving that nobody is incorruptible. Though Toby is typically portrayed as

mentally challenged, he is not daft. Throughout the time that Mrs. Lovett is growing her

business, Toby is undeniably seeing things that don’t make sense, overhearing murderous

conversations between the two adults, and smelling scents that are very different from other

animal meats. Combine this building paranoia with his protectiveness and obsession with Mrs.

Lovett and he becomes a crazed, terrified young man capable of murder. Toby vows to protect

Mrs. Lovett at all costs, a pure and loving promise, however when placed under the

circumstances at the end of the show, his promise turns homicidal and carried out by revenge.

His now tainted innocence is echoed once again as he follows the directions from the deceased

Mrs. Lovett and continues to crank the meat grinder.

Johanna allows her love for Anthony to blossom into something so powerful that she

doesn’t think twice about taking another’s life. To her, Anthony is an escape from the damaging,

cold life she’s been living. This idea of an out is something she had thought tirelessly about,

otherwise she never would have jumped at the chance to go to run away with him like she did in

“Kiss Me.” Her obsession with this idea begins to grow wild once she is locked in the asylum on

false pretenses, another psychologically damaging event. Anthony, though prepared by Sweeney

to shoot and kill, is not able to pull the trigger. It is Johanna, relief coursing through her veins
 Erika Bailey

and trigger happy with the thought of escape, who murders the asylum’s owner. Love, in its

ruthless, selfish, and crazed state, is the root cause of her obsession and crime.

Mrs. Lovett shows that one need not dirty her hands in order to take a life. She lets her

obsessive jealousy of Sweeney’s wife shut her mouth and keep her from revealing the other’s

status as the beggar woman. Every single killing could have been avoided if, once Mrs. Lovett

realized Sweeney’s identity, she would have told him that his victimized and abandoned wife

was the beggar woman. This makes her just as accountable for Sweeney’s murders. She never

had to hold the blade against another’s throat, but it makes no difference in who’s to blame. This

is supported further by the fact that Mrs. Lovett is who places the idea in Sweeney’s head to kill

the nomads who wander into his shop. She benefits from these murders – not only does her

business boom, but she keeps Sweeney upstairs and within her grasp. This obsession with him

and with the goods that he provides her make her an even accomplice in the murders that

Sweeney commits. Fanciful dresses and a fat purses cannot hide her guilt, and her sins are

revealed to Sweeney by the end of the show. They end their lives just as guilty as the other.