The Cambridge Footlights, commonly referred to simply as Footlights, is a student sketch comedy troupe located in Cambridge, England. Footlights was founded in 1883, and is one of Britain's oldest student sketch comedy troupes. The comedy society is run by the students of the University of Cambridge.
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 Cambridge 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, Barnwell, Cambridge, 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".
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. Having established a tradition of performing at the annual Edinburgh Festival Fringe, 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.
The first woman to be given full membership was Germaine Greer. She joined in October 1964 on the same day as Clive James and Russell Davies."Pete & Clive", BBC Radio 4, 9 November 2015, from 00:06:43. There had been women before that time who had been allowed to join in, including Eleanor Bron in the late 1950s, but Greer was the first to be billed as a full member. Apparently Tim Brooke-Taylor was instrumental in having women admitted.Boston, Richard (3 June 1983). "From the archive, 3 June 1983: Cambridge Footlights celebrate 100 years of comedy", The Guardian. She was part of the Footlights' 1965 revue My Girl Herbert.
Over the next decade, Footlights members came to dominate British comedy in the 1970s, creating and starring in shows such as Not Only... But Also, I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, At Last the 1948 Show, That Was the Week That Was and The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, forming comedy groups such as Monty Python and The Goodies, and generally fuelling the satire boom.From Fringe to Flying Circus – 'Celebrating a Unique Generation of Comedy 1960–1980' – Roger Wilmut, Eyre Methuen Ltd, 1980. During the 1980s, Footlights reinforced its position at the heart of British comedy. The 1981 revue, featuring Emma Thompson, Hugh Laurie, Stephen Fry, Tony Slattery, Penny Dwyer and Paul Shearer, 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 including Armstrong and Miller and Mitchell and Webb. Their revue, The Cellar Tapes, at St Mary Street Hall was billed as "the annual revue: one of the strongest casts for several years, has already toured in southern England with great success."
Former members have gone on to win Oscars, BAFTAs and other awards and enjoy success in the entertainment industry.
Activities During term, Footlights produce the regular "Smokers"—an informal mixture of sketches and stand-up—at the ADC Theatre. The club also produces the annual Pantomime (in collaboration with ADC) and the Spring Revue, as well as staging the winning entry of the Footlights Harry Porter Prize; a competition in which any student at the university may enter a one-hour comic play. The Footlights International Tour Show takes place from June until October, and travels to Cambridge, London, Edinburgh and venues across the United States. For information about individual Footlights revues, see Cambridge Footlights Revue.
Membership Potential members apply to the organization at two times during the year, once at the end of the university's Lent term and the other at the beginning of the university's Michaelmas term. Students who study at the University of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin University are able to apply for membership. Students must be at least in the third year or above in their undergraduate studies to apply for membership. Postgraduate students are also eligible to apply to be members of the Footlights comedy society.
Former members
This is a list of former members of Footlights who achieved notability after graduating from the University of Cambridge.
Presidents The elected leader of the University of Cambridge 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.
Notable past 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?) Jan Ravens (of Dead Ringers), the first female president Hugh Laurie (of Fry and Laurie, Jeeves and Wooster and House) Tony Slattery (of Whose Line Is It Anyway?) Neil Mullarkey (of Austin Powers) Sue Perkins (of The Great British Bake Off and Mel and Sue) David Mitchell (of That Mitchell and Webb Look and Peep Show) Robert Thorogood (creator of BBC One's Death in Paradise) Richard Ayoade (of Garth Marenghi's Darkplace and The IT Crowd) Simon Bird (of The Inbetweeners and Friday Night Dinner) Phil Wang (of Daphne Sounds Expensive), comedian
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, Bt. 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 Roper Fraser 2016 – Oliver Taylor 2017 – Dillon Mapletoft 2018 – Ruby Keane 2019 – No president; committee-led 2020 – Jade Franks 2021 – Adedamola Laoye 2022 – Ayush Prasad 2023 – Niamh Howat 2024 – Margaret Saunderson 2025 – James Allen 2026 – Freya Bielby
Notable incidents
Comedian Tim Key was a member of the Cambridge Footlights, despite not being a student at Cambridge University. He famously bluffed his way into a production of Treasure Island, written by Alex Horne, by posing as a PhD candidate at the university. He performed in two other shows with the Footlights, during which he met Stefan Golaszewski and Tom Basden.
See also Cambridge University Amateur Dramatic Club Cambridge University Light Entertainment Society The Oxford Revue
References
External links Official website Official International Tour website Past members and shows Footlights Alumni Association The Cambridge Footlights Review, 1982