Sweeney Todd features an all-star South African cast that includes our Audrey from Little Shop of Horrors – Candice van Litsenborgh - alongside Michael Richard, Jaco van Rensburg, Anne Marie Clulow, Adam Pelkowitz, Luciano Zuppa, Wesley Swain Lauder, Cameron Botha, Pauline du Plessis, Sanli Jooste, Claire Simonis, Megan Rigby, Schoeman Smit and a very special welcome back to our stage after many years touring overseas in Cats – Earl Gregory. The MD for the show is Rowan Bakker while costume designs are by Neil Stuart Harris. Lighting is by Tina le Roux.

This musical thriller by American theatrical genius, Stephen Sondheim, features one of the greatest musical theatre scores ever written. It tells the outlandish tale of urban legend, Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, who famously murdered his clients in his barber chair, where after his whacky neighbour, and partner in crime, Mrs Lovett, turned them into much sought after meat pies. Set in 19th Century England, Sweeney Todd looks at what drives a man to this sort of extreme revenge and obsession, and considers what tragedy lies in his dark and mysterious past. This gripping musical features the classic songs Pretty Women; Johanna; Not While I’m Around; By the Sea; A Little Priest, and The Ballad of Sweeney Todd.

Sweeney Todd won both the Tony Award and the Olivier Award for Best New Musical when it was first produced in 1979, and is now also a major motion picture by Tim Burton, starring Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham-Carter, Alan Rickman and Sacha Baron Cohen as the sly fop Pirelli.

Sweeney Todd is on at Pieter Toerien’s Montecasino Theatre from Friday, 9 October to Sunday, 29 November. It will show Wednesdays to Fridays at 20:00, on Saturdays at 16:00 and 20:00, and on Sundays at 15:00.

To book your ticket to Sweeney Todd, phone Computicket on +27 11 340-8000 or Theatre Box Office on +27 11 511-1818. Tickets cost R350, R250, R150 and R100.

*Image courtest of Val Adamson.