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The Lawrence Arts Center’s slow Sweeney Todd needs sharpening.
october 31-november 6, 2013
pitch.com
T
here’s no sugarcoating it: Stephen Sondheim is hard. And Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street might be the composer’s most exacting show, requiring straight-razor musical precision. So kudos to the Lawrence Arts Center for taking on a serious dramatic challenge with its production of the bloodthirsty classic. Director Ric Averill has gathered a capable cast to meet the capricious harmonies and punishing rhythms head-on. Mark Rector stars as the brooding barber, returning to London after 15 years’ banishment to avenge himself against crooked Judge Turpin, who captured his wife and daughter. He’s joined by optimistic young sailor Anthony and Mrs. Lovett, a struggling Fleet Street meat-pie proprietress Partners in crime: Anderson and Rector ready to turn Todd’s bloodlust into a business Pirelli’s scene is symptomatic of a larger opportunity. He’ll cut the throats of his choicest customers and send the corpses down to problem. The cast’s prodigious vocal talents are undermined by blocking that frequently her shop to be used as pie filling. Rector is a competent Todd, but the show appears scattered and unfocused. With the notable exception of Anderson, the company unequivocally belongs to Jill Anderson, whose mills lethargically around the stage. Mrs. Lovett is equal parts tender matriarch Set designer Mary Nichols does an admiand deranged pragmatist. Anderson plays the rable job creating diverse staging opportunibackstabbing baker as a comic queen, riffing in a pinched Cockney air while she commands ties, but they go largely unexploited. Scenes are frequently stretched across the wide apron the stage with her commitment and preciin undefined playing areas. Late in Act 1, Todd sion. From her auspicious entrance in “The jumps through the imagiWorst Pies in London” to Act nary fourth wall of his barber 2’s “By the Sea,” the actress Sweeney Todd: shop into Mrs. Lovett’s chopinfuses each song with the The Demon Barber house below. A power pose, energy and specificity that of Fleet Street to be sure, but one that leaves Sondheim’s masterwork Through November 2 at the us pondering the logistics of demands. Lawrence Arts Center, this space a little too long. The young lovers are sim940 New Hampshire, The production seems at ilarly strong. As Johanna, Lawrence, 785-843-2787, lawrenceartscenter.org times to have been designed Julia Geisler performs a with a much larger space in wistful rendition of “Green mind, from the overworked Finch and Linnet Bird” in her clear soprano. Joe Winans lends his rich, follow spots that dwarf Art Kent’s evocative operatic voice to her paramour, Anthony, with stage lights to the harsh contour lines of Tobias’ and Todd’s makeup. (Steffani Day’s costumes a full vibrato that occasionally overwhelms work at this scale, though, infusing the produchis consonants. (That issue may have been compounded by a microphone problem during tion with Victorian gothic flair.) The Free State Liberation Orchestra brings last Friday’s performance.) Company players Sondheim’s difficult music to life under Joe Carr and Alex Goering are strong as well, Patricia Ahern’s skillful conducting. “Not attacking the prologue and expositional numWhile I’m Around” is a notable highlight, and bers with crisp, expressive singing. the orchestra beautifully underscores stunning Gender-blind casting is increasingly common, but talented soprano Amelia Rollings work by Anderson and Jacob Leet (as Tobias). The Lawrence Arts Center’s production may seems miscast as Todd’s tenor adversary, not have hit its stride yet, but strong compoAdolfo Pirelli. The directing choices in Pirelli’s nents suggest that subsequent performances, opening scene don’t help the comic moments in the spirit of Mrs. Lovett’s pies, could refine land — in an attempt to suggest a London crowd, the small company clumps around the recipe into a meal worth sampling. her in the center of the stage, playing havoc with sight lines. E-mail feedback@pitch.com AngelA C. Bond
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