"Sweeney Todd ... to permit only traces of bold color — mostly red — to accent a world dominated by shades of gray, blue, white and black. Sweeney Todd returns with the single-minded intention ...

Which is why Sondheim’s musings about Sweeney Todd, and musical cinema in general ... is reflected in the nigh black and white color scheme running throughout the pallid film.

One would be hard put to identify two tales more disparate than “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street,” and “The Color Purple,” the two plays opening in Gainesville in October.