The story of Sweeney Todd is firmly ingrained in the cultural landscape, having been presented in books, films, a very well-known musical by Stephen Sondheim and even an exhibit at the London Dungeon. So much so that you could be forgiven for thinking that the story of the Demon Barber of Fleet Street is a real life historical crime story, such as Jack the Ripper, even though it is completely fictional. This notion may have been compounded by the statement sometimes used to advertise the original play, that it was “founded on fact”
The origins of this gruesome story date back to its first appearance as a Penny dreadful serialisation in The String of Pearls, which ran from 1846 to 1847. Not long after, the story was turned into a melodrama which premiered at the Britannia Theatre in Hoxton. Opera della Luna have used this original script by George Dibdin Pitt, along with a score taken from the works of theatre music composers of the era (as the original score for Sweeney Todd is long lost) , to lovingly recreate a long forgotten genre of theatre.