Footlights

Footlights

The ADC Theatre is the home of the Footlights.
Formation	1883
Type	Theatre group
Purpose	Amateur theatrical club
Location	Cambridge University, Cambridge, England

Cambridge University Footlights Dramatic Club, commonly referred to simply as the Footlights, is an amateur theatrical club in Cambridge, England, founded in 1883^[1] and run by the students of Cambridge University.

History

Footlights' inaugural performance took place in June 1883. For some months before the name "Footlights" was chosen, the group had performed to local audiences in the Cambridge area (once, with a cricket match included, at the "pauper lunatic asylum"). They wished to go wider than the University Amateur Dramatic Club (ADC), founded in 1855, with its membership drawn largely from Trinity College, and its theatre seating only 100. They were to perform every May Week at the Theatre Royal, the shows soon open to the public. A local paper commended the Club's appeal to the "general public, the many different classes of which life in Cambridge is made up".^[1]

The club grew in prominence in the 1960s as a hotbed of comedy and satire, and established a permanent home in the basement of the Cambridge Union.^[2] Having established a tradition of performing at the annual Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the club entered the mainstream when its members formed half of Beyond the Fringe, the hugely popular stage revue which toured Britain and America in 1960. The 1963 revue then followed in the footsteps of Beyond the Fringe, appearing in Edinburgh and London's West End, before travelling to New Zealand and the United States, where it made appearances on Broadway and The Ed Sullivan Show and received a full-page review in Time. Over the next decade, Footlights members came to dominate British comedy, creating and starring in shows such as I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, At Last the 1948 Show and That Was The Week That Was, forming comedy groups such as Monty Python and The Goodies, and generally fuelling the satire boom.^[3][4][5]

During the 1980s, Footlights reinforced its position at the heart of British comedy. The 1981 revue, featuring Emma Thompson, Hugh Laurie, Stephen Fry, Rowan Atkinson, Tony Slattery, Penny Dwyer and Paul Shearer,^[6] won the inaugural Perrier Award at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and spawned Fry and Laurie, the first in a long line of popular and successful double acts formed at the club.^[7][8][9] Many of its former members have gone on to win Oscars, BAFTAs and other awards and enjoy success in the entertainment and media industry.

Today, Footlights is recognised as a finishing school for many of Britain's most well-known comic entertainers.

Activities

During term, Footlights produce the regular and very popular Smokers – an informal mixture of sketches and stand-up – at the ADC Theatre. The club also performs plays, pantomimes and sketch shows and least one revue, usually in the spring. Outside of term, the Footlights go on an international tour, performing new material in the West End and the USA. In 2015 the international tour show expanded to include Paris, Edinburgh, the USA, Canada, and the Cayman Islands.^[10][11] For information about individual Footlights revues, see Cambridge Footlights Revue.

Notable former members

This is a listing of former members of Footlights who achieved notability after graduating from Cambridge University.

Presidents

The elected leader of Cambridge University Footlights Dramatic Club is known as the president, who is assisted by a vice-president, treasurer, archivist and several other posts to form the committee.

Past notable presidents have included the following:

• Peter Cook (of Beyond the Fringe, Pete and Dud and Not Only... But Also), "
• Tim Brooke-Taylor (of The Goodies, I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again and I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue)
• Graeme Garden (of The Goodies, I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again and I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue)
• Eric Idle (of Monty Python)
• Clive James (Author of Cultural Amnesia and Unreliable Memoirs)
• Clive Anderson (of Whose Line Is It Anyway?)
• Hugh Laurie (of Fry and Laurie, Jeeves and Wooster and House)
• Tony Slattery (of Whose Line Is It Anyway?)
• Sue Perkins (of The Great British Bake Off and Mel and Sue)
• David Mitchell (of That Mitchell and Webb Look and Peep Show)
• Richard Ayoade (of Garth Marenghi's Darkplace and The IT Crowd)
• Simon Bird (of The Inbetweeners and Friday Night Dinner)
• John Oliver (of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver)

List of presidents

1886 – F. W. Mortimer 1887 – J. J. Withers 1890 – Oscar Browning 1891 – C. M. Rae 1892 – Oscar Browning 1894 – Oscar Browning 1895 – Oscar Browning 1896 – H. C. Pollitt 1897 – H. C. Pollitt 1898 – M. V. Leveaux 1899 – S. W. Burgess 1900 – O. J. Goedecker 1901 – R. J. White 1902 – E. K. Fordham 1904 – G. S. Heathcote 1905 – G.S. Heathcote 1906 – H. Rottenburg 1907 – H. Rottenburg 1908 – J. S. Murray 1909 – L. B. Tillard 1910 – A. R. Inglis 1911 – A. R. Inglis 1912 – P. D. Ravenscroft 1913 – C. A. A. Douglas Hamilton 1914 – M. Cutherston 1919 – B. D. Nicholson 1920 – B. D. Nicholson 1921 – M. D. Lyon 1922 – M. D. Lyon

1923 – F. E. Powell 1924 – J. A. C. Barradale 1925 – H. J. Warrender 1926 – J. D. Houison Craufurd 1927 – H. C. Martineau 1928 – H. E. R. Mitchell 1929 – J. Fell Clark 1930 – J. C. Byrom 1931 – R. S. Hill 1932 – P. E. Lyon 1933 – J. A. Coates 1934 – Lord Killanin 1935 – Harry Lee 1936 – Peter Crane 1937 – Albert E. P. Robison 1938 – P. B. Meyer 1939 – Sir Robert Ricketts 1947 – D. C. Orders 1948 – D. C. Orders 1949 – Simon Phipps 1950 – Adrian Vale 1951 – Ian Kellie 1952 – Andrew Davidson 1953 – Peter Firth 1954 – Leslie Bricusse 1955 – Brian Marber 1956 – Tim Berington 1957 – Allan Mitchell 1958 – Peter Stroud 1959 – Adrian Slade

1960 – Peter Cook 1961 – Peter Bellwood 1962 – Robert Atkins 1963 – Tim Brooke-Taylor 1964 – Graeme Garden 1965 – Eric Idle 1966 – Andrew Mayer 1967 – Clive James 1968 – Jonathan James-Moore 1969 – Barry Brown 1970 – Adrian Edwards 1971 – Richard MacKenna 1972 – Steve Thorn 1973 – Robert Benton 1974 – Jon Canter 1975 – Clive Anderson 1976 – Chris Keightley 1977 – Jimmy Mulville 1978 – Martin Bergman 1979 – Robert Bathurst 1980 – Jan Ravens 1981 – Hugh Laurie 1982 – Tony Slattery 1983 – Neil Mullarkey 1984 – Nick Hancock 1985 – Kathryn Crew 1986 – Nick Golson 1987 – Tim Scott 1988 – Peter Bradshaw 1989 – Roland Kenyon

1990 – Henry Naylor 1991 – Sue Perkins 1992 – Dan Gaster 1993 – Mark Evans 1994 – Robert Thorogood 1995 – Charlie Hartill 1996 – David Mitchell 1997 – Sarah Moule 1998 – Richard Ayoade 1999 – Kevin Baker 2000 – Matt Green 2001 – James Morris 2002 – Ed Weeks 2003 – Stefan Golaszewski 2004 – Ed Riches 2005 – Raph Shirley 2006 – Simon Bird 2007 – Will Sharpe 2008 – Sam Sword 2009 – Alastair Roberts 2010 – Abi Tedder 2011 – Mark Fiddaman 2012 – Phil Wang 2013 – Harry Michell 2014 – Ben Pope 2015 – Thomas Fraser 2016 – Oliver Taylor

See also

• Cambridge University Light Entertainment Society
• The Oxford Revue

Sources

Information about the Footlights Revues during the first one hundred years of the Cambridge University Footlights Dramatic Club (1883–1983) and the people who appeared in them, with a foreword by Eric Idle.^[12]

References

1. "Footlights history". Footlights.org. Retrieved 16 September 2013.
2. http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/comedy/features/the-cambridge-footlights-first-steps-in-comedy-1517691.html
3. Footlights!—'A Hundred Years of Cambridge Comedy'—Robert Hewison, Methuen London Ltd, 1983.
4. From Fringe to Flying Circus – 'Celebrating a Unique Generation of Comedy 1960–1980' – Roger Wilmut, Eyre Methuen Ltd, 1980.
5. The Broadway League. "Cambridge Circus". Internet Broadway Database. Retrieved 16 September 2013.
6. "Talents who sparkled in comedy's Hall of Fame". BBC News. 24 August 1998. Retrieved 11 March 2016.
7. "Why Footlights is a breeding ground for double acts". BBC News. 6 December 2010.
8. "The South Bank Show: The Cambridge Footlights". University of Cambridge. 30 January 2009.
9. "The Cambridge Footlights: First steps into comedy". The Independent. 28 January 2009.
10. Footlightsontour.co.uk
11. Camdram.net
12. Hewison, Robert (1983). Footlights! – a hundred years of Cambridge comedy. Methuen London Ltd. ISBN 978-0-413-51150-8.

External links

• Official website
• Official International Tour website
• Past members and shows
• Footlights Alumni Association
• The Cambridge Footlights Review, 1982