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Sweeney Todd is a musical from 1979 by Stephen Sondheim which was adapted in the 2007 Tim Burton film.
Benjamin Barker had been transported from London and imprisoned for 15 years in an Australian labor camp before the musical begins. He manages to escape and is rescued from the sea by Anthony Hope, a sailor on a ship called The Bountiful. He returns to London, with Anthony. It's at this point the musical begins.
When the two arrive in London, Barker explains to Anthony that he used to be happily married to Lucy Barker and had a daughter named Johanna, but the corrupt Judge Turpin also wanted Lucy, so he sent Barker to prison on a false charge.
Adopting the new name Sweeney Todd, he returns to his old barbershop above Mrs. Lovett's pie shop, where he learns from her that Judge Turpin, soon after having him transported, lured Lucy Barker to a masquerade ball at his mansion under the viel of an apology. She drinks a beverage which is drugged and is raped in front of the party guests by Judge Turpin, with no one intervening under the presumption that she is just drunk. Lucy attempts to take her own life with after the attack, and Turpin takes in Johanna as his ward, but come to desire the now sixteen-year-old sexually, as he did for her mother. Sweeney vows to avenge his wife, rescue his daughter, and get revenge on everyone who was involved.
After a fatal encounter with Signor Adolfo Pirelli who tried to extort him, Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett come up with a plan to dispose of the bodies. This plan is that Sweeney will kill people and Mrs. Lovett will use their corpses as a free supply of meat to keep her struggling restaurant above water.
Antony, meanwhile, falls desperately in love with Johanna, and swears to save her from Judge Turpin, who plans to marry her by monday. He tries to visit her, but is attacked by Judge Turpin and his Beadle who warn him never to come back to see Johanna.
As Mrs. Lovett's business becomes increasingly successful, Mrs. Lovett dreams of moving to the seaside with Sweeney and Pirelli's former assistant Tobias Ragg, that she has taken to herself as an assistant and has steped in to be his mother-figure.
But once the killing has begun, there's no going back, and things begin to spiral out of control.
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