THREE DEMON BARBERS WITH NO WAITING - SWEENEY TODD IN THE MOVIES

In the world of horror movies, popular characters show up in multiple films and remakes. I would not attempt to cover the numerous film versions of Frankenstein, Dracula or Dr. Jeckle and Mr. Hyde, in one post. On the other hand, there are three film versions of the story of Sweeney Todd. That can be done.

The character first appeared as a villain in a penny dreadful entitled The String of Pearls in the 1847. He turned up in several stage plays, radio dramas, TV productions and the famous Stephen Sondheim musical from 1979. However, there have only been five movies. Two of them are from the silent era and not easy to come by. As for the sound era, there are three film versions that I intend to look at in this post: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street from 1936, Bloodthirsty Butchers from 1970, and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street from 2007.

One thing became obvious watching these three films this weekend, the story contain some of the same elements and same names, but never quite present the story exactly alike. All three feature Sweeney Todd, Mrs. Lovett, as well as characters named Tobias and Johanna. However, each one has its own quirk or trademark to the story, including sailors fighting natives at the Cape of Good Hope, a public showdown with an Italian barber and an Irish, Shakespeare-quoting, cross dressing, clown named Corky.

I'm going to start off with the most recent and best version. Director Tim Burton's big screen version of the Stephen Sondheim musical stars Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter in the roles of Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett. The 70s stage version gave Sweeney Todd a back story that had not been present in other versions, which made him slightly sympathetic rather than a hard-core killer. Besides being motivated by revenge, Sweeney's first murder is of a former assistant, who has reinvented himself as an Italian barber and plans to blackmail him after he best him in a public shaving exhibition. In this version, Tobias is a young sailor, who saved Sweeney's life, and Johanna is Sweeney's long, lost daughter.

As with most of Tim Burton's films, Sweeney Todd inhabits a dark, gloomy, grim version of London brimming with little touches that make the film a blood-soaked nightmare. However, the one thing that I didn't care for was the Stephen Sondheim songs. To para-phrase Homer Simpson, "Why did they have to ruin a perfectly good demon barber story with all that fruity singing?"

Now, I should say here that I've owned two of these movies (Bloodthirsty Butchers and Demon Barber of Fleet Street) on DVD for sometime. I had watched them several times before this weekend. However, after watching Tim Burton's masterpiece, I chose to re-watch Andy Milligan's 1970 version entitled Bloodthirsty Butchers right after the 2007 version. WOW! Talk about a sharp contrast in production, dialogue and everything. This version has John Miranda and Jane Hilary as Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett. Annabelle Wood is Johanna, who is employed by Mrs. Lovett. Tobias is played by Milligan regular, Berwick Kaler. Tobias works for both Sweeney and Lovett. He is as cold blooded a killer as Sweeney.

An awkward moment between Sweeney (left), Anna and Corky (right)

This version also features Sweeney's alcoholic wife Becky (A woman in Victorian England named Becky?), Mrs. Lovett's invalid husband, Sweeney's mistress/musical hall performer Anna and her on-stage partner, Corky the Irish, Shakespeare-quoting, cross dressing clown (above). The extra characters are there to facilitate one of Andy Milligan's trademarks: boring, unnecessary dialogue and spiteful bickering. Sweeney even gives Johanna's fiancee a sexist rant that includes an illusion to PMS. Johanna is the only likeable female character in the movie.

While Burton takes you into a gloomy version of Victorian London, Milligan really doesn't even try to pass 1970 London off as Victorian London. Sweeney Todd's name is painted on the window of his modern barber shop in green paint. The barber shop has a black and white tile floor (another Milligan trademark). The women's costumes are cute and colorful 70s maxi-dresses, probably made by Andy Milligan himself. Speaking of Milligan's dressmaking career, his old, leftover, rubber mannequins make an appearance as the victims of Sweeney and Tobias. One of the highlights of this film is an outdoor scene that features Milligan barking like a dog while filming to add a bit of ambient noise. When you watch an Andy Milligan film by itself, you notice what is wrong with his films, but watching this film immediately following Tim Burton's version, it is obvious that Andy Milligan makes Ed Wood look like..., well, Tim Burton.

Finally, there is the 1936 George King version entitled The Demon Barber of Fleet Street staring Tod Slaughter as Sweeney and Stella Rho as Mrs. Lovett. In this version, Tobias is an orphan boy entrusted to Sweeney by Beadle (A character that appears in the Burton version) to work as his assistant. Johanna is the daughter of a wealthy business partner that Sweeney hopes to force into marriage. The film ends with Johanna disguised as a boy, as in the 2007 version.

This version is adapted from the original stage melodrama versions of the story in which Sweeney is a mean, greedy villain, who rubs his hands together and laughs maniacally. If Slaughter had a handlebar mustache, he would be twirling it (Actually he did in some of his films). Slaughter's Sweeney is at his menacing best when he says, "Come here, Tobias!" and "Now, I'll polish you off" as the opens the trap door beneath the barbers chair.

Slaughter and King were frequent collaborators, much like Burton and Depp. There films were part of the "quota-quickies" and later turned up on late-night television. They can now be found in Mill Creek box sets. King is not a spectacular or artistic director like Tim Burton, but his films look decent and work as a whole, unlike Milligan. King, on a tight budget, manages to include a small scale battle between a group of sailors (lead by Johanna's fiancee) and natives at the Cape of Good Hope. King does play with the story telling format by having a comical wrap-around sequence with a modern barber telling the story of Sweeney Todd to a customer.      

The subject of Sweeney Todd in the movies may not lend itself to a whole book, but for a blog post it works out well. You can also watch all three of these movies in one night, just like I did. Ironically, it left me with a craving for meat pie.      

Jonathan Frid, who played Barnabas Collins in ’Dark Shadows’ show, dead at 87

Jonathan Frid, who played Barnabas Collins in ’Dark Shadows’ show, dead at 87

I was planning to create a post about Dark Shadows and Barnabas Collins, when I read of Jonathan Frid's passing.

My post was going to be called, "WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH BARNABAS COLLINS' HAIR?" It was a in-joke perpetrated by Dark Shadows creator and executive producer Dan Curtis on line producer Robert Costello. Originally, Barnabas was not a character on the show, he was added in 1967 when the show was on the verge of being cancelled. However, the famous painting of Barnabas was always in the foyer of Collinwood (That is it in the above photo behind Frid), there just wasn't any features on the face except for the distinctive hair style.

When the before the show went on the air, it was decided that portraits would be hanging around Collinwood of various Collins ancestors. Staff members posed for the portraits, but the faces were not filled in because they wouldn't be show up on camera.

Robert Costello posed for the foyer portrait of a man holding a fancy walking cane with a large onyx ring on his finger. Dan Curtis gave the artist painting the portrait extra money to paint the hair on the man to look like Robert Costello's bad toupee.

When the Barnabas character was to be introduced, it was decided that the portrait in the foyer was of him. They added Jonathan Frid's facial features, but unfortunately the Barnabas character would be stuck with having hair that looked like a bad toupee. Now, Johnny Depp will be sporting the hair that looks like Robert Costello's bad toupee.

       

BEST OF DESDINOVA: THE MOD SQUAD WAS COOLER THAN 21 JUMP STREET (Sorry Johnny Depp)

I realize many people of my generation will hate this post. There will even be some Baby Boomers that will hate this post.

In TV history, there were two cops shows that featured young people going undercover to investigate crimes involving other youth. These shows were the Mod Squad, which ran from 1968 to 1973. The other was 21 Jump Street, which ran from 1987 to 1991.

I remember watching an episode of 21 Jump Street when it first air on the then-new Fox Network and thinking, "This show sucks. I hope they come up with a better show than this or this network with go the way of Dumont and Overmyer Networks." The show not only ran longer than I expected, but Fox has survived, thanks to several great shows like the Simpsons, Family Guy and In Living Color.

It was about this time that a purchased a book called The Best of Crime and Detective TV: The Critics Choice by John Javna and Max Allan Collins. In this book, they list the TV show, Mod Squad, as one of the worst cop shows ever. They practically trash the show (They also slam Charlie's Angels, which makes me wonder about these guys).

I had only seen the Mod Squad reunion movie from the late 70's, but I still thought it probably had to be better than 21 Jump Street for the simple reason it was made in the late 60s/early 70s. As many of you readers know I have always had a special place for the psychedelic era.

I bought a VHS tape a few years ago that featured two episodes of the Mod Squad. I liked it quite a bit and wanted to buy another, but they were taken off the market for some reason. A year ago, I bought a DVD of the first season of the Mod Squad. It featured a longer version of the pilot episode which was on the VHS tape I had earlier. I have enjoyed it very much and plan to buy another DVD set of the show.

A few nights ago, I found the entire first season of 21 Jump Street on DVD at Wal-Mart for $5. I wondered if my opinion of 21 Jump Street would have changed after seeing more than one episode of the Mod Squad. Maybe I would be blown away by the show which gave us Johnny Depp. It turns out, I was right the first time I saw the show. It still sucks.

While people often malign the Mod Squad for being dated, 21 Jump Street is a product of it's time too. It comes with the things of the 80s that I hated. Bad part is some of those attitudes are still with us, thanks to the Fox News Network. As a matter of fact, I suspect that Bill O'Reilly wrote a few of these scripts under an alias. I bet Sarah Palin was a Jump Street fan.

The Mod Squad was from the age of peace, love and "Do Your Own Thing," while 21 Jump Street was from the age of "Just Say No," "Positive Peer Pressure," "overachieving" and "Vigilante Justice." Also, the characters on 21 Jump Street wear the clothes of that era that my mom forced me to wear. When I moved out and went to SMSU, I started dressing more like the Mod Squad.

First off, let's discuss the theme song and opening credits. The theme song of the Mod Squad was composed by Earl Hagen. Hagen created a tough and fast pasted cops show theme, augmented by a psychedelic/garage band organ. The visual was the main characters running through a dark warehouse.

The 21 Jump Street open featured a theme song sung by the cast that sounded like a bad Debbie Gibson song ("You're gonna learn something when we meet you after school" GAG!). The visuals were goofy clips of the cast from episodes. This gives you the impression you are watching a bad sitcom.

The overall plot of the shows are different in that Peter, Linc and Julie ("One White, One Black and One Blonde") were juvenile delinquents paying their debt to society by becoming undercover detectives. They did carry guns or badges. They often questioned the ethics of what they were doing. Yes, they do use quite a bit of the slang of that era. Pete seems to use the word "heavy" a lot, Julie says "groovy" quite a bit and Linc made the phrase, "Solid, Brother" a part of TV history.

On 21 Jump Street, Hanson, Penhall, Hoffs and Loki are cops who look young enough to infiltrate high schools. They carry guns and badges. When the Jump Street cops aren't whining about lawyers and judges "letting off" the people they bust, they insult each other.

The villains on Mod Squad are never the kids, but old, white guys trying to make a money by selling drugs or killing young people. One villain, played by Dabney Colman (Who else?) tells his sister, "Your hippie friends are driving down the value of my real estate." One villain is a Bill O'Reilly-ish talk show who tries to rape Julie. Yes, the message of the Mod Squad could be "No such thing as a bad kid" and "Don't trust anyone over 30."

On the other hand, 21 Jump Street embedded with the 80's idea of "young-people-are-evil." The criminal is always young. Everything from gun toting gang members taking a school hostage to a group of cocaine pushing, preppy-boys who gang-rape/murder a girl to sexually-repressed, pyromaniac Catholic school girls (No, I didn't make this last one up).

Jump Street episodes usually end with a PSA/lecture from the cast about under-age drinking, drug abuse or abstenence. Mod Squad ended with a crane shot of the characters and somber jazz music as the characters contemplate what just happened. Truth is the Mod Squad has a more expensive look to it than Jump Street.

Yes, this has probably been a useless rant, but I had to get this out of my system. I'm sorry Johnny Depp couldn't have been like Clint Eastwood, John Travolta or Bruce Lee and gotten his start on a good show. As a matter of fact, he has said he hated the show.

Just remember, the Maharishi says never drink campaign from a paper cup. Solid, Brother!