Sweeney Todd
September 2016

Sweeney Todd is show built around a complex relationship between a pie shop, a barber chair, and a big smokey oven. The transitions between scenes must be seamless as they move in time with the music, frequently multiple locations in the span of 60 seconds. It's a delicate balance between aesthetics and mechanics, particularly if you choose to build the chair yourselves like we did. 
The set is centered around a 16' wide turn table that houses on the first level the Lovett's Pie Shop, her parlor, and the cellar bake house. On the second level resides Sweeney's Tonsorial Parlor. The chair is added at the top of the second act. When Sweeney kills a customer, a trap door is lowered below that then becomes a ramp. It connects with a lower ramp, and the chair seat drops down to a matching angle when Sweeney pulls the lever down, allowing the actor to slide down the "chute" into a hidden hallway inside the turn table. There was also a trick trunk on the second level with a removable bottom, allowing one of our actors to get stuffed into the trunk after his death. 
Around the turntable was a catwalk and series of bridges to create a playground for the large ensemble. There were hidden slipstages under the 8' wide bridges that allowed for furniture to quickly track for smaller interior scenes. Above the bridges were Juliet balconies for some key Johanna moments. I chose to focus on the pie and barber shop, and allow other locations like the mansion and sanatorium to be conveyed more abstractly within Fleet St.