TRUE OR FALSE: " Sweeney Todd, Demon Barber of Fleet Street" was based on a real serial killer?

Question

During the late 18th century , a soon to be notorious serial killer by the fanciful name of Sweeney Todd {alias Benjamin Barker} opened up his barber shop for business on the historical fleet street of London...

He took his "blood lust" out on his victims by means of his handy straight razor and a trick barber chair that would fall backwards and dump whoever was sitting on it through a trapdoor to the basement below - the fall crushing the skulls

or breaking the necks of his rich "patrons" ....

Those that were not dead yet he would make sure of

strip them of their valuables

and with the help of his lover made the remains into "meat pies" as a barbaric "inside" joke

Sweeney Todd is listed as one of the first serial killers in Scotland Yard's documented files ---

His exploits were later made into an award winning musical that landed on Broadway in 1979 and an academy award winning movie in 2007 {nominated 3 times}

The real Sweeney Todd could not sing....

Answer 1

its true! :D

Answer 2

I believe it is one of the most well documented files of the era at Scotland Yard.  The fact that it became a musical is quite creepy, but there are some songs from the musical that are truly powerful and quite good.  But, yes, it is based on a true story!

Answer 3

false

they did a documentry about this rumor on the limited addition 2 disk sweeney todd dvd and said theres no evidence to support that there was a real sweeney todd

Answer 4

If you GOOGLE Sweeney Todd you will find that the musical that Stephen Sondheim wrote was based on a series of books that was rumored to be true.  I studied the musical of that area in a musical theater class and it is quite interesting.  I have not seen the movie yet with Johnny Depp but I can imagine that it is pretty good.  Those type of roles are best done by Depp.

But to answer your question I would have to say yes it is true.  I can not believe that someone would of came up with something like this many years ago if it was not true.

Answer 5

false

Answer 6

The story is false. There is evidence to say the story may have been loosely based on a true story, very loosely based. The story originated during a time of great poverty in England where there were scares as to the origins of the meat that people were selling. The scare was real, the man was not.

Answer 7

TRUE! and he dumped the bodies into alleyways of an old building, where it usually smelled really bad anyway.......

Answer 8

False. Sweeney Todd is a fictional character.

The figure of Sweeney Todd is possibly based on an urban legend. In the novel Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-4) by Charles Dickens, published some two years before the appearance of Sweeney Todd in The String of Pearls: A Romance (1846-7), a character called Tom Pinch is grateful that his own "evil genius did not lead him into the dens of any of those preparers of cannibalic pastry, who are represented in many country legends as doing a lively retail business in the metropolis" There is also a similar story reputed to have occurred on the Rue de la Harpe in Paris that may well have influenced the story.

Claims that Sweeney Todd was a real person are made in the original introduction to the 1850 edition of The String of Pearls. Such claims have persisted to the present day.

In two books, Peter Haining argues that Sweeney Todd was a historical figure who committed his crimes around 1800. Nevertheless, other researchers who have tried to verify his citations find nothing in these sources to back Haining's claims.

A check of the website at Old Bailey for "Associated Records 1674-1834" for an alleged trial in December 1801 and hanging of Sweeney Todd for January 1802 show no reference.