SWEENEY TODD (1979) How exciting was it to work on one of the most celebrated musicals ever written? Absolutely incredibly exciting! Once again, a legion of art directors and designers were on hand to make our presentation at J. Walter Thompson Entertainment a spectacular event. After seeing nearly (I’m not joking) 100 concepts, the favorites came down to a silhouette graphic of Mrs. Lovett and Sweeney with their heads chopped off and my drawing. My Sweeney art was based on an old woodcut and I added Mrs. Lovett drawn in the same style. I had met with Harold Prince who showed me costume sketches in which the Mrs. Lovett character appeared very fat. He explained he was going to talk to his star about wearing padding but hadn’t yet. Angela Lansbury was just back from Egypt where she had finished filming Death on the Nile. I was asked to go to her apartment to show her the artwork so she could approve it. I fortunately thought to render four other Mrs. Lovetts in various weights ranging from obese to svelt. Ms. Lansbury couldn’t have been nicer but was taken aback by the girth of some of my renderings. I told her I’d heard mentioned the possibility of her wearing a “fat suit.” Without missing a beat, her response was, “I’ll just play it fat. Let’s go with the thinnest drawing.” The final suggestion Stephen Sondheim made: “Add more blood.”