- May 2020
You enter. Only illuminated is a DJ deck and its DJ. Specifically Dee-Jay’s (Dee-Jay, short for Davy Jones, short for David Michaelangelo Jones III) Deck who stands entranced in their set. Cue blaring beats and lightning lights -- as we reveal that it is, in fact, DeeJay and his DJ decks that control the show, providing the framework for the sketches that will ensue, the characters (and their lives) who enter the nightclub each night. We learn what goes on in the toilets, on the dance floor, at the bar, in the smoking area and in one hour, for one night, we play out what happens in one night at Bizzare (read like Ballare).
The club is a site for every libidinal urge - sexual, relaxational, danceual - to be satisfied
from c.11pm to c. 2am (6am, if dissociating in the uber back from junction) in confining, dark walls and sticky floors, the club becomes a dense microcosm of society's basest instincts released and unrepressed. Club Night is a ballad to that sweet frenzied intellectual shutdown.
- April–May 2020
'And in all the important things I did conform. "How can he be a spy? He goes to my tailor."'
Famous actress Coral Browne is on tour in Moscow in 1958 when infamous English spy Guy Burgess barges into her dressing room and throws up in her sink. The two Cambridge graduates meet for lunch the following day to discuss all things comfort, culture and civility.
With secret police following their every move, and Soviet-UK relations at an all-time low, Guy invites Coral to navigate the streets of Moscow with one motive: the obtaining of a new English suit from his tailor in London. Based on a true story, Alan Bennett's An Englishman Abroad is a powerful probing of British values and our place in history.
- April 2020
A school shooting tears one woman's world apart. In the aftermath, she finds herself disempowered and hopeless, surrounded by the fragments of her broken life. But then, all of a sudden, she gets caught in the crosshairs of a new, unlikely obsession which propels her to the steps of Washington, leaving her message ringing in the ears of those who refuse to pay attention. As she steadies her aim, she remembers the advice the old man in the gun shop told her: “fire on the exhale.”
This one-hour, one-woman monologue confronts the ubiquitous trauma of gun violence in a highly personal way. Discarding the politics and the age-old debates about gun control, Zimmerman’s monologue gets to the heart of a very human tragedy.
- March 2020
Grotesque, surreal and absurd!
Meet Sasha and Misha, the Ukrainian soldiers of the Donbas hybrid war. Meet also their dead dogs - Ollie and Boi. All trapped together in a bombed pet shop on the Eastern Front, accompanied by unexpected visitors and smart-ass radio.
In this grotesque and surrealistic story human perspective is mixed with that of animals, the well known world, although under fire, slowly disappears in the fumes of absurdity. Is anthropocentric perspective the legitimate one? Who has the right to decide the fate of other living creatures? What is man capable of and are there any borders?
- March 2020
"I've had the most wonderful day... I looked at a bud vase." Homer and Langley Collyer are brothers. Homer is sardonic, irascible; Langley child-like, a virtuoso at the piano. They have always lived together in their crumbling house, where junk encroaches at every corner, sniping and fighting - but then worldly, normal, socialite Milly enters their lives, struggling to be involved in a world where truth doesn't seem to matter.
- March 2020
'Like chalk – she just rubbed it all out and started again.'
A broken home: after the death of their mother, two mixed-race sisters are left in the care of their white father. When the elder sister disappears, suppressed racial tensions bubble to the surface and relationships are pushed to their limit as we are forced to interrogate whether our identities are set in stone, or whether we have the freedom to represent ourselves?
- March 2020
'Lovesong' is a hauntingly beautiful drama which explores the relationship between William and Margaret, taking place across two different timeframes - when the couple are just embarking on their lives together in their twenties, and as they reminisce about the past in their seventies. Time bleeds into itself as old and young collide and the couple are forced to confront their younger selves, and to figure out if it was all really worth it in the end.
Originally performed in collaboration with Frantic Assembly in 2011, this wistful and uplifting story is a tale of love, memory, loss, time and peaches.
- February 2020
A microbiologist for a defence contractor is being investigated by his employer over an incriminating memo leaked to the press. He thinks his wife may have done the whistleblowing - to protect her and himself, he must learn how to beat a lie detector. With his best friend spying on him, his wife opening old wounds and his polygraph consultant uncovering his dark secrets, he is forced down a path of paranoia and bitterness.
- February 2020
On the eve of Singapore’s National Day in 1988, 3 people are killed along the Pan-Island Expressway (PIE), Singapore’s oldest expressway which cuts through the heart of the country.
An interrogator has 60 minutes to question James, whose script, ‘PIE’ foretold these 3 deaths. Somehow surviving a car accident along the PIE that killed both his parents just moments after he was born, James grew up to become an unsuccessful playwright who now faces accusations of murder.
As the fragmented story of what ‘actually’ took place unfolds, the line between the ‘real’ and the ‘official’ narratives blurs, as James is forced to confront an interrogator intent on writing her own script - that James is a Communist conspirator who masterminded these deaths to ignite widespread dissent. Set against the backdrop of the global Cold War and the 1987 ‘Marxist Conspiracy’ in Singapore, Pan-Island Expressway promises to be a riveting comedy, political drama and whodunit mystery - all in one play.
- February 2020
The iconic night of new student writing is back for one night only in the Corpus Playroom.
Get ready to laugh, cry, and have your thoughts provoked by this fresh crop of new Cambridge theatre, and bring a couple of Qs for the writer/director/actor Q&As!
- February 2020
Who knows you best?
A) Yourself
B) Your mum
C) Your best friend of 12 years
D) An obscure data server on the edge of the Arctic Circle
Alex has just started university and feels like a fraud, which is ironic because they’ve also had their data hacked and all their money stolen. In their quest to get their money back, Alex has to go through a series of increasingly intrusive security checks that leaves them seriously questioning some of their life choices... and not just because of the old Facebook statuses the identity thief seems to be dredging up.
Told through a combination of sketches and self-deprecating comic monologues, Identity Crisis takes aim at Big Data through a comic lens.
- February 2020
‘Well, I'm here now, I'll always be here.’
Revealed posthumously with the note ‘publishable, but worth it?’, Maurice is a gay love story by E.M Forster that encapsulates the struggle of being a closeted gay man in Edwardian England and the joy of reclaiming a happy ending. Despite having heterosexual norms insistently impressed upon him from a young age, when Maurice enrols at Cambridge University and meets Clive Durham, a fellow ‘unspeakable of the Oscar Wilde sort’, he finds that he cannot choose to continue repressing what he feels, and must wrestle with the consequences.
This adaption breathes new life into Forster’s novel, telling a queer period story about acceptance, love and identity, while also seeking to bring the story back home to Cambridge, a place of special significance to him.
- February 2020
Hey, have you ever noticed how everything in your life kind of goes wrong but exclusively in a dramatic fashion? Ever feel like maybe your life is just so crazy it feels like it was designed for other people’s entertainment? Well, we have. It could be bad luck, or it could be the narcissistic belief that our lives are somehow more interesting than everyone else's. Either way, come stroke our egos by watching us for a whole hour!
See three of Cambridge’s funniest ladies (self-defined) and enjoy a fun-filled mix of stand up and sketches.
- February 2020
Ever felt like the first year who doesn’t quite fit in? Even though you’re wearing your shiny new Dino Stompers? Like how the hell is this not the key to social stardom and the undivided attention of that unreasonably attractive guy who just happens to have gone to the same public school as your (somewhat unhinged) friend Posh Immy? I mean they were £60 off Depop for God’s sake. And now you’re crying in the pastry aisle of ALDI … Again.
- February 2020
Deptford, 1982: unemployment abounds and the 1981 Brixton race riots are fresh in everyone’s memories. Caught in the midst of these racial divides are Chima and Onochie: two mixed-race brothers, sons of an Irish mother and a Nigerian father. Finally returning home from prison after he was blamed for the death of a white girl, Chima is horrified to find out that his younger brother, Onochie, has become a skinhead who no longer thinks of himself as black. As brutal justice seeks Chima out, Onochie must decide whether he will side with the community he’s tried so hard to belong to, or stand by the flesh and blood he barely knows.
- February 2020
Come on down to the bottom with this open ocean sketch show. Follow Michael Phelps as he seeks official recognition as a fish and watch Steve the anxiety salmon as he regrets becoming a dentist for sharks.
The ice caps are melting, sea levels are rising and now even the Corpus Playroom is underwater. Meet a vegan piranha, the only octopus in the ocean who can't multi-task and a puffer fish Prime Minister as we answer the timeless question of whether fish would drive cars or submarines? BYO snorkels and make sure you do not slip on the plankton on your way in. Swimming lessons available on the door.
- February 2020
"Beware the Ides of March"
Shakespeare's brutal political tragedy explodes onto the Corpus stage.
Is anyone fit to lead in a world of blood, lies and revenge?
In this radical reimagining of Julius Caesar, no one is safe.
- February 2020
She came, she saw, she was not impressed. Graduating Footlight Jahan Tapadar is here to give you an exclusive, one night only, tell-all insight into the world of a brown Muslim comedian in Cambridge. Did any white men manage to save her in the end? And does she know that she doesn't have to wear a hijab now that she's in the West? You'll have to come and find out for yourself at this one woman comedy hour. Tea will be spilled, hearts may be broken, but PREVENT will definitely be called.
- January–February 2020
'What gets me through is knowing I took this pain, and saved all of you from suffering the same.'
Stumbling down Clifton Street at 11:30 a.m. drunk, Effie is the kind of girl you'd avoid eye contact with. We think we know her, but we don't know the half of it. Effie's life spirals through a mess of drink, drugs and drama every night, and a hangover worse than death the next day - till one night gives her the chance to be something more.
Gary Owen's powerful adaptation of the enduring Greek myth drives home the high price people pay for society's shortcomings, and offers a rallying cry for those pushed down by the powers that be.
- January–February 2020
“Look at the moon. How strange the moon seems! She is like a woman rising from a tomb. She is like a dead woman. One might fancy she was looking for dead things…”
Late night, unreal city. The Tetrach is hosting a wild underground banquet. Salome - daughter of Herodias, Princess of Judea - escapes from the oppressive atmosphere of the party and the lascivious gaze of her step father.
Under the transforming moon, bodies become otherworldly and enchantingly strange. Through Wilde’s rich and symbolic mastery of language, we experience the world augmented through the eyes of Salome, culminating in the rapturous and notorious 'Dance of the Seven Veils'.
This new Soma Theatre production captures the queer and ecstatic spirit of Wilde’s most neglected and misunderstood play. In a world fluttering between enchantment and disenchantment, the familiar and the unfamiliar come face to face, breaking down boundaries of gender and exploring what it means to truly ‘see’ one another.
- January 2020
- January 2020
‘The Internet had always been a glitch in the fabric of reality; a shivering, white-hot portal where you could be everywhere and nowhere, all at once. But suddenly it seemed more like a vortex, or a black hole…’
Alarmed by the culture of surveillance shaping the virtual world, five young people conspire to delete their digital traces forever. Searching through the archives of a secluded medieval church, two historians encounter a mysterious network of tunnels. CTRL-Z explores memory and mysticism in the Information Age, asking what it means to disappear in a world obsessed with preservation.
TCS 4.5 stars
Varsity 4 stars
The Tab 4 stars
- January 2020
‘I’m actually handling it all incredibly well. I haven’t eaten a single tub of Ben & Jerrys.’
Long cold nights, short cold days, three 9ams a week, and a slowly-healing heartbreak – Robin’s winter stretches on without an end in sight.
Luckily, with Sam and Jamie in the next rooms along, life feels a bit warmer and brighter, even if it does mean hearing Jamie’s terrible music blasting out in the early hours and waiting an extra 40 minutes any time Sam’s in the shower. Friendship lights up G corridor where the crappy uni lighting fails.
But as Robin recovers and the trio tightens, things start getting complicated and feelings stand to get hurt. Love blooms, priorities waver, and chocolate mug cakes can’t quite chase off the lingering February chill.
Funny, heartfelt and moving, Spring Robin follows the happy highs and lonely lows of three friends in a corridor in the coldest, darkest season, but ultimately asks: if winter comes, can spring be far behind?
Previous praise for the writing:
‘clever and insightful [...] brilliantly funny while also being incredibly poignant’ (Varsity)
‘funny and witty [...] utterly sensitive and articulate’ (TCS)
‘exhibits a deep sensitivity and awareness’ ‘its sardonic wit caused [...] irrepressible hysterics’ (The Tab)
‘[the] characters are deliberate and well-developed’ ‘a beautifully balanced, honest play’ (edfringereview)
- January 2020
As Britney once said, there are only two types of people in this world: the ones that entertain, and the ones that observe. ‘Put-on-a-show kinda guy’ Will Owen is ready to entertain, so he’s throwing a comedy dance party like no other.
FOMO is about parties, popularity and praying that you won’t get left behind. Join “attention-seeking” (Chortle, Will’s mum) Cambridge Footlight Will for an “energetic and hilarious” (Varsity, Your Dad) hour of stories, characters and sketch, as he learns how to dance like everybody’s watching. With a soundtrack of pop diva classics you thought you left in your last Year 6 disco, Will explores all the times life doesn’t quite go the way you’d imagined. So get out of my head and onto the dance floor, or else you might get FOMO.
- January 2020
We all know that the MI5 man watching us through our webcams knows everything about us. Angela Channell has just one question: "is he judging me?". With a search history that ranges from WebMD to Mumsnet to "song that goes ba da ba da baa", she's not quite sure all this monitoring is worth his time.
Stumbling through a world where privacy means nothing, join the Cambridge Footlight as she drags out the deepest, darkest corners of her online activity in front of a live audience.
"Truly hilarious" - The Young Perspective
"Real flares of comic genius that will leave you crying with laughter" - The Tab
"Is most receptive to our targeted ads at 3am on Tuesdays" - Mark Zuckerberg, probably
- January 2020
Are We There Yet? is an improvised show about the journeys we all go on and the strange in-between places we find ourselves in along the way.
- December 2019
- December 2019
‘How does it feel?’ is back - with more performances, more performers and more stories than ever before.
In case you’d forgotten (but how could you forget?), ‘How does it feel?’ presents an hour of perspectives that are not often heard. The show will be an hour of pieces written and performed by LGBTQ+ people, foregrounding voices often under-represented or not widely known. It promises to be warm, funny, informative, emotional, fresh and -- most of all -- honest.
From stand-up and sketch comedy to personal stories, naturalism to absurdity, the show will be a space for people to express themselves in their own terms. We hope you come away laughing, thinking and feeling in ways you might not have expected.
CONTENT / TRIGGER WARNINGS:
This show is intended to be a comedic and light-hearted reclaiming and reframing of negative experiences by LGBTQ+ people, however it should be noted that there is:
Strong Language
References to Self-Harm
References to Sexual Assault
Themes of Queer Prejudice
Queerphobia
Homophobia
Transphobia
Genderphobia
Ableism
Gender Dysphoria
Identity Conflict
Hiding Sexuality
Addressing Stereotypes
Themes of Exclusion/Isolation
Historic Reference to Execution of Queer People
- December 2019
‘Her name is Antigone, and she’s going to have to play her part right through to the end.’
The city of Thebes is broken. Two royal brothers lie dead by each other’s hand, and the princess Antigone is caught in an impossible position. Trapped between duty to those she loves and to those who rule her, she must either obey the law and keep her life, or break the law and die for it. The struggle that ensues will define her family for generations, and will define her life within a matter of hours.
Jean Anouilh’s re-imagining of Sophocles’ ancient tragedy captures the intensity of the battle between individual and state with a sharply modern viewpoint. This is a story in which we can all see ourselves – and as it goes on, we realise there is no escape.
- November 2019
'Jarr my bes pal in da whole whirl.'
'Jarr my life, Pig.'
Pig and Runt were born on the same day, in the same hospital. Growing up in Cork, they've created a whole world of their own, and an unrivalled connection to each other. On the cusp of adulthood (their seventeenth birthday), they go out on the town and rip up the streets like they've never done before.
But adulthood poses its problems and possibilities, a future which breaks into their lives as feelings, aspirations and violence seep into the glittering underworld of their youth.
Disco Pigs is Enda Walsh's propulsive, explosive ode to youth, a two-hander like you've never seen before in a world you never thought you could imagine.
- November 2019
"But you've asked a simple question, and I've told you why. It wasn't on a dare or on a whim. It's hard to comprehend now that the reason why, was simply that I went along with him."
Relationships can be murder. In 1924, two wealthy Chicago University students abducted and murdered a young boy for no reason other than wanting to carry out ‘the perfect crime’. Thirty-four years later, the true motives were revealed. Stephen Dolginoff’s one-act musical brings real-life thrill killers and homosexual lovers Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb to centre stage. It focuses on their dysfunctional romantic relationship, and how it eventually led to their imprisonment for ‘the crime of the century’. With a fast-paced narrative and captivating score, Thrill Me tells a story of obsession, sex and misguided philosophy.
- November 2019
'I don't know why I'm crying...
Am I suspended in gaffa?
Every one hundred years, the cailleach, the hag, must bathe herself in the sea to become young again. Would you be reborn, if you had the chance?
Covering everything from Gaelic folklore to Kate Bush, with some Radio 4 on the way, keep Helena Fox company for an evening including storytelling, film, poetry, singing (don't worry, not hers), and more.
Helena's previous work:
2nd place at Man Up! 2019
'Helena Fox’s persona...is also particularly well done... it provided a humorous social commentary without becoming didactic.' (Varsity)
'My favourite act of the night, King Hoberon's emotive spoken word' (Tab)
‘I have a huge crush on King Hoberon but who doesn’t at this point’ (Queerbridge)
- November 2019
ANERDYFANGIRL394 is a one woman show, structured as a book reading with elements of stand up in its style. With the aid four diaries, the show focusses on my teenage years, honing in on particularly embarrassing anecdotes and passages of writing. The centrepiece of the show is the fanfiction ‘Dean and Jo: Son of a Bitch’, a 26,689 word long masterpiece written by me at the age of 14-15, including some questionable erotic passages, and some attempts to be deeply romantic. Diary extracts and stories from the same age range would come alongside the fanfiction, with more of range between hilariously embarrassing and more personal/reflective points to be made. Essentially, ANerdyFangirl394 would be an exposing and amusing perusal through the written evidence of my adolescence, working through questions concerning sex, sexuality, self-esteem, and school, and having fun with the ideas and issues that fifteen year olds must endure.
Think My Dad Wrote A Porno but combined with the angst of a young teenage girl who has just discovered Tumblr. One idea is for two audience members to be handed extracts of said fanfiction, and have them ‘perform’ the dialogue. Diary extracts and stories from the same age range would come alongside the fanfiction, with more of range between hilariously embarrassing and more personal/reflective points to be made. Essentially, ANerdyFangirl394 would be an exposing and amusing perusal through the written evidence of my adolescence, working through questions concerning sex, sexuality, self-esteem, and school, and having fun with the ideas and issues that fifteen year olds must endure.
- November 2019
Fifteen year old Jamie is in love with his classmate Ste. When Ste has to move in for a few nights, the two boys start to develop romantic feelings for one another. All would be well if they didn’t have to navigate an alcoholic father, an abusive step-father, nosy friends, and over-bearing mothers. Not to mention coming to term with sexuality in urban London in the early 90s. ‘Beautiful Thing’ is an empowering and funny play about acceptance, endurance, and young love.
- November 2019
Steven and Charlie were happy. They were in love. They were getting ready to spend the rest of their lives together. There was just one problem: Charlie died. Now Steven is left picking up the pieces. On top of losing his boyfriend, he now has to deal with Charlie’s family and friends while holding the funeral together. A one-man humorous and heartfelt look at the realities of losing someone you wanted to spend the rest of your life with at the age of 21, the difficulties of admitting that there is a special person for you, and the difficulties of serving cheese and pineapple on the same cocktail stick.
- November 2019
It’s a bustling lunchtime today in Market Square until: the electricity goes out!!! Stall owners rally round to point the finger of blame as their rice threatens to putrefy, and the slow cookers just aren’t cooking at all! Eco-Steve doesn’t care, though. Eco-Steve doesn’t use electricity, pesticides, or plastics. His produce is all Organic™ and, boy, don’t we all know about that. Good for you, Steve. The market is one of the most successful in all the land, bringing together foods and products from all over the world, and the charismatic characters that hand make them with love. Who could possibly sabotage such a place? We all think it’s Dodgy Darren but CHRIST ALIVE, GLADYS!?! Don’t go around telling people! Quick everyone, back to your stalls. The show must go on. (Specifically, an hour long sketch show of eccentric characters - yippee!)
