“This role is one of the greatest women in the American musical theater canon,” she said. I’ve seen it as a woman trying to be.”
The production has an all-star team. The film will be directed by Tony Award-winning Hamilton Kale and produced by Hamilton’s lead producer Jeffrey Sellar. The choreographer is renowned British movement director Stephen Hoggett, and set designer Mimi Lien is not only a Tony Award winner, but a MacArthur Foundation laureate. “Genius” granted.
This will be Groban’s second star turn on Broadway. In 2016, he led the cast of ‘Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812’, which received critical acclaim and a Tony Award nomination. Ashford has a longer track record on Broadway. She has appeared in her seven Broadway shows and won her first Tony Award in 2015 for “You Can’t Take It With You” after being nominated for her first for “Kinky Boots” in 2013.
The revival of “Sweeney Todd” with Hugh Wheeler’s book comes at a time of growing interest in Sondheim’s work. His new production of ‘Into the Woods’ was one of the best-selling shows on Broadway this summer, with a cast led by Daniel Radcliffe off-Broadway in ‘Maryly We Roll Along’. ‘s revival is going to be tough. Tickets, given that the New York Theater Workshop where it’s performed has only 199 seats.
Sondheim and Groban formed a friendship In the years before the composer’s death, Groban regularly performed Sondheim’s songs in concert, with Sondheim reaching out when “The Great Comet” was performed. Sondheim died just three days before the Revival’s first workshop began. He was scheduled to participate in the reading on the last day of the workshop.
The original Sweeney Todd hit Broadway in 1979 and won eight Tony Awards, including Best Musical. It has been revived twice on Broadway and has been widely performed elsewhere. In 2007, it was made into a Hollywood movie directed by Tim Burton, starring Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter.