“By the Sea,” her sweetly sung fantasy of domestic bliss, is absurdly endearing. She bustles convincingly in “Worst Pies in London,” and she and Mulligan make “A Little Priest,” the Act I showstopper, deliciously funny. Hilariously cheerful, always scheming, she’s a crafty helpmate to Todd, shouldering much of the labor involved with the horrifying business of turning men into meat pies.

Her voice is a marvel - large, resonant and beautifully modulated - and she makes Mrs. Nothing was lacking in Blythe’s performance.

But he makes the transformation from murderous intent to a deranged hatred of all mankind in gradual, credible strokes. Mulligan has a handsome baritone voice, and he deploys it effectively in Todd’s songs such as “The Barber and His Wife” and “My Friends.” He doesn’t project quite as well in the numbers requiring greater force, and much of his performance - his first in the role - misses a measure of Todd’s explosive fury. Now he’s returned to exact his revenge, even if he has to cut half the throats of London to do it. The barber spent 15 years at hard labor on a trumped-up charge, losing his wife and daughter to the judge who persecuted him. When the title character emerges from the shadows, his story begins to unfold. As the musical begins, a crowd gathers in the shadows of the set’s lowest level, with Tanya McCallin’s designs, bathed in Rick Fisher’s gloomy lighting, evoking the filth, poverty, and danger of Fleet Street. Lovett, Todd’s enthusiastic partner in crime, brought the work’s murderous characters to life.ĭrawn from the pages of penny dreadfuls, “Sweeney Todd” is set in dark Victorian London. SFO principal guest conductor Patrick Summers led a gripping orchestral performance, and a strong cast starring baritone Brian Mulligan in the title role and mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe as Mrs. Lee Blakeley’s grandly imagined production, co-owned by San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and Paris Theatre du Châtelet, highlights the musical’s ravishing power, mordant wit, and insinuating psychological depth. Saturday’s opening was impressive on multiple fronts.

Sweeney todd houston grand opera