- November 2021
Ghost stories: isn’t it time for a new one?
Improltergeist! lets you help us create a brand new story to pass down the generations. In a mysterious world of your choosing, who is going to go bump in the night, and why?
Each show is a unique creation for and by its audience, and will delight you with adventure, ghouls and laughter.
- November 2021
‘Ships are safe in harbour. But that’s not what ships are for.’
Astrid has never set foot on solid ground: as the first and only child born in space, she faces her whole life on board the spaceship Mara. But when an asteroid strike decimates their oxygen supply, she and the crew of the ship must abandon the mission and return home before it’s too late.
From the award-winning, five-star writing team behind Rust and Life With You, this original musical explores what it means to know who you are. Set against the breathtaking and deadly backdrop of space, Astrid and the others travelling on the Mara grapple with life, friendship, and loss.
When it really matters, we risk everything to make it back to the only home we truly know: Earth.
- October 2021
Following the success of Dragtime! Presents: #squadghouls and Dragtime! Presents: Things That Go Bump N' Grind In The Night, Cambridge's premiere drag troupe is back again with yet another hour of cabaret fun and this time it's even spookier :O :O :O This autumn Dragtime! are returning to the ADC with their third Halloween show, presenting the best new drag talent the city has to offer. Hold on to your seats as Dragtime!'s kings, queens and inbetweens take you on a thrill-inducing ride through the dark side of drag, featuring singing, lip sync, spoken word, pole dance, burlesque, live music and more!
- October 2021
Moses and Kitch stand around on the corner – talking shit, passing the time, and hoping that maybe today will be different. As they dream of their promised land, a stranger wanders into their space with his own agenda and derails their plans.
Emotional and lyrical, Pass Over crafts everyday profanities into poetic and humorous riffs, exposing the unquestionable human spirit of young men stuck in a cycle that they are desperately trying to escape.
- October 2021
Salmonella is the Footlights Harry Porter Prize Play Winner for 2020, judged by comedian and ex-Footlight, Phil Wang.
Salmonella follows the young adult life of best friends Sam and Ella as they navigate early adulthood and all the laughter and tears that come with it! Meanwhile, 60 years on, in the old people's home, Sam and Ella reminisce on their youth together and consider...how much has really changed?
The play takes us through the ups and downs of early adulthood, charting the downright ridiculous scenarios that the two get into in their new flat together.
- October 2021
A student-written sketch comedy dell art(gallery)! Follow us through the evening happenings of an art gallery quite unlike any other! From snobby artists to bewildered school guides, from chatty Picasso's to truly moving art (wait a darn second, that's not supposed to move!!!) from the worst possible art heist to the inner thoughts of the paintings on the walls: Did Leonardo Di Caprio truly paint the Mona Lisa? Is modern art a whole bunch of tosh? Was Van GHOghST always this attention seeking?Just how pretentious is TOO pretentious?? Put on your nicest berets, pick up your stencils, and come and see this mosaic of comedy.
Oh, and before I forget,
DON'T TOUCH THE ART!!!
- October 2021
Marlene has just received a promotion at her job agency and she’s on top of the world. To celebrate, she hosts a dinner party for all her most interesting female friends. The strange part? Her guests include a thirteenth-century Buddhist monk, a Pope, and a figure from Flemish folk lore.
‘Top Girls’ explores Marlene’s rise to success in the Thatcherite 1980s, from surreal dinner party chat, her thriving job agency, and all the way back to the family she left behind, and questions whether successful women can truly be allowed to ‘have it all’.
- October 2021
All it takes is Mike spilling a drink on Jaz at a party, and bang, a few months later they’re sharing a flat filled with supernatural toast and arranging Christmas dinner together – it’s domesticity on warp speed really. But, all good, healthy friendships require communication, and Jaz and Mike are not too great at the whole ‘talking about their feelings’ thing – which is fine until it isn’t really fine at all. A charmingly chaotic mix of comedy, tension, and drama ensues as we take a bittersweet look at two young adults trying to navigate an increasingly complex friendship. One that could be simplified relatively easily if Jaz befriended the internet when it comes to disability rather than placing the onus on Mike to explain All The Time.
Written by a creative team with first-person experience of the type of physical disability represented in the show, Attrition pulls you into the intricacies of trying to adult when it feels like the world, and worse, your friend can't see you for you.
[Image description: an illustration of a piece of toast with a bite taken out of the top right-hand corner, in the centre of the toast is the word ‘attrition’ written in dark brown.]
- October 2021
- October 2021
Anne is on the brink of becoming queen and the country is in the midst of war and a succession crisis after the death of her children. She is criticised, doubted and satirised by all. She battles to overcome the subservient role she has assumed her whole life and become the queen England needs. She is pushed and pulled by court factions, political parties and most devastatingly by her closest friend, Sarah Churchill, with whom she has long been infatuated. As their relationship turns sour Sarah resents the queen’s incompetence in comparison with her own brilliance and will stop at nothing to prove herself the most powerful woman at court and avenge herself on her former lover.
Queen Anne takes the male dominated genre of the history play and places women at its centre, portraying fierce friendship, sexuality, jealousy, war, politics and betrayal through the eyes and inner lives of women.
- October 2021
Five ex-comedians, who were all responsible for one of the most notoriously terrible comedy revues of all time, are each invited to the same abandoned theatre... only to realise that they are trapped. Yes, trapped! By a mad captor! He wants them to make him laugh, and they have only an hour to prepare their material. If they don't, then they may well face a fate worse than death. Can they pull off such a thing? Come and see for yourself...
- October 2021
Cambridge Footlights Emily, Robbie and Maddie are bringing an hour of irreverent sketch comedy to the ADC this October!
Track their journey and peep through the letterbox as they meet the weird, wonderful and downright wacky. As Tina waits for 415 working days for her vibrator, Mr McMoon wonders if she’s the full package. The community officers investigate a suspicious parcel in the children’s playground, whilst local teens look in every nook and cranny in search of the dark web. Join these three comics as they courier you through a mashup of quirky characters and outrageous observations, shedding light on the everyday to the truly extraordinary.
- October 2021
Ella Hickson's 'The Writer' is a work of meta-theatre which addresses what it means to challenge the status quo; if it’s even possible to do so; and the personal costs of attempting it. If we want to change the world how should we write the new stories? The play attempts to answer such a question through brittle scenes which navigate gender, love, race, sex, and money. From a young woman forgetting her bag and a row over a cassoulet, to surreal memories of a lake and distorted realities, The Writer is attempting to destabilise the establishment from within.
Funded by the Lady Margaret Players.
- September 2021
It’s time to laugh… Present Laughter is the most autobiographical of Noël Coward’s plays and deals with the ‘price’ of fame as theatrical impresario Garry Essendine entertains both male and female stalkers in his studio: a long suffering wife, a longer suffering personal assistant and a close circle of friends, all ‘a charming constellation of gossipy little planets circling round the great glorious sun’. This riotous but revealing farce is being brought energetically to life, as Coward intended, by Bawds (directed by David Sear). In an era of #MeToo and celebrity culture, its relevance to 2021 is clear.
- September 2021
Join us for a celebration of amateur drama – 10 short plays by drama groups from Cambridge and around, and this year from farther afield too! Everyone will be striving to present their best work, which our professional adjudicator will comment upon and judge which is the best overall dramatic achievement. Will you pick the winner? Might you spot up and coming young stars of theatre?
- September 2021
- July 2021
Combining elements of comedy, tragedy and farce, The Playboy of the Western World is set in a remote village on the coast of Country Mayo in the west of Ireland. There is great excitement when a young man on the run from the police seeks shelter for the night in the village public house. His crime transforms him from an intensely shy young man to a local hero, but events unfold which cast doubt on his new-found status. After scandalising upright Dublin citizens at its premiere in 1907, this tragicomic masterpiece has been delighting and entertaining audiences the world over ever since.
- July 2021
Ballet Central returns to Cambridge with its new tour this summer. This renowned company of young graduate dancers will be performing a crowd-pleasing mix of dance pieces by leading choreographers including Scenes from Le Corsaire, a thrilling classical ballet with romance and daring, dashing pirates and magical pas de deux set against a backdrop of the high seas; a new creation Jigsaw by upcoming choreographer Charlotte Edmonds to a commissioned score by Ballet Central Resident Composer Philip Feeney and to finish, Act 2 of Matthew Bourne’s Highland Fling, a gothic fable of winged fairies, romanticism and kilts filled with wit, magic and wicked humour.
- June 2021
-Do you think this is the year we become real playwrights?
-We haven't had an audience larger than the cast since 1587, and that was back when we were doing erotic puppet shows in Saffron Walden.
Tom and Rob languish in a bedsit situated somewhere between 1590s Deptford and undergraduate accommodation built in the 60s. They're greasy, cold, and fancy themselves writers; Rob drinks too much and Tom is bad.
‘The Parnassus Players’ is an original student-written comedy, set within a fusion of the 21st century student theater scene and the theatrical world of 1590s London. It follows two budding writers, Rob and Tom, in their struggle to navigate the scrappy underworld of Shakespeare's London and attain literary stardom.
Join these vagrants for an innovative satire and celebration of live theater! We're talking queer Elizabethan romance, goofs, gaffs, the Phantom of the Opera, and more bawdy puns than you can shake a pickled herring at!
- June 2021
‘The Trouble With Today’s Women’ is a verbatim piece of devised theatre. The show title takes inspiration from Sudha Buchar’s ‘The Trouble With Asian Men’. With performers and collaborators in different geographical locations, the show explores the experiences of women of colour in the modern world and grapples with the dissonance that they face navigating their personal lives. This production will explore pluralities of positions instead of a single meta-narrative, through the authentic voices of performers that will navigate themes of fragmented identity. Developed through workshops and interviews, personal stories on various themes will be adapted for a multi-media performance.
- June 2021
In a dingy flower shop on Skid Row, Seymour’s discovery of a rare and exotic plant, Audrey II, turns his world upside down. The plant’s survival and his rise to fame and fortune however come at a cost: his own flesh and blood. Set to the sound of 1960s Rock n Roll and a backdrop of dark humour, we watch Seymour grapple with a blossoming love, a masochistic dentist and an avaricious boss as he struggles to do the right thing. Will his trials and tribulations end with Audrey somewhere that’s green, or will the monstrous flora have other plans?
Content Warnings
Abusive Relationship (prolonged, mentions of and shown)
Death (frequent, on stage, often comedic tone)
Blood (Simulated with plots/set dressing)
Torture (Brief comedic mention in song, character shown to enjoy inflicting pain without anaesthesia)
Guns (visual prop, no gunshot sound)
Dentist (scenes of wishing to inflict teeth damage but nothing explicitly shown, dental drill sounds)
Implied Self Harm (brief)
Implied/Accidental Suicide (both staged)
Drugs (addiction to nitrous oxide, overdose)
Flashing lights (used throughout certain songs)
- June 2021
- June 2021
Just when you thought that C*VID had wiped us out, CUMTS presents you with the gift of Gala. For one night only, CUMTS brings you an evening of pure musical theatre decadence. Dressed to the nines and accompanied by a full orchestra, the finest of Cambridge’s Musical Theatre Talent will be performing all of your favourite musical theatre classics alongside the latest Broadway hits, all dazzling with glitz and glamour…
- June 2021
A wealthy merchant by the name of Jenrick retires, thinking he's settling into a life of relative peace and composure. Philosophic rest, you might call it. But his long unrequited love, his disgruntled business partner and his plotting servants don't quite have the same thing on their minds.
A lot of plotting and hijinks ensue, and it seems that not one of these schemers is going to get much rest, unless it's an eternal one.
- June 2021
On air they're seasoned professionals - but when the cameras stop rolling, no-one is sticking to the script!
Join the Cambridge Impronauts as they host a hilarious improvised news show dealing with drama on camera, and behind the scenes! Friendships will be tested, romance will blossom, stories will break: and most importantly YOU will be controlling the whole thing!
We will be taking prompts LIVE throughout the show, giving you the power to invent our top stories and weigh in on the unfolding workplace drama! Is our special correspondent interviewing a jelly baby? Does our weatherman have a secret past? Can our anchors navigate the messy aftermath of a joint business venture gone wrong?
Tune in to tonight's programme for all this and more in 5, 4, 3, 2...
- June 2021
Live Musical Theatre is back! Whether you’re a newcomer or a Finalist looking for their final chance to smash it on stage, The Spotlight is the perfect opportunity to belt one of your favourite musical theatre songs, whether that be a classic or something a bit more new!
This edition, with a return to live performance, will feature a LIVE AUDIENCE (omg) and also performers will have the exciting chance to workshop their songs (also in person) before the performance night with a Director and Musical Director! Such high quality performances with the glitz and glamour of a full stage with our brilliant Musical Director Alex accompanying, will make this event like no other!
- June 2021
CW: rape, mention of suicide
Is Justice really blind? Should she be?
Two friends find themselves opposing lawyers on a rape trial.
They have no connection to the people whose lives they are debating.
As their versions of the truth are challenged and their own lives made a lot less certain, will they understand what their jobs really mean?
Are you a reliable witness? Is anyone?
- June 2021
A feast for musical theatre fans, this hilarious parody is a long-awaited chance to relish some of the form’s most popular styles. One plot is spun into five musicals, each in the distinctive style of a different musical master: Rodgers & Hammerstein, Stephen Sondheim, Jerry Herman, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Kander & Ebb all take their turn. The plot? Ingenue June can't pay the rent and is threatened by her evil landlord. Can the leading man rescue her, with Abby’s help? With music by Eric Rockwell, lyrics by Joanne Bogart, and book by them both, come and join our celebration.
- May 2021
Join three hapless criminals as they attempt the heist of their lives: stealing the Crown Jewels. Watch as they assemble their team, plot their path, and even fall in love on the way. Will they swagger off with the swag, or be swept up in the long arms of the law? Either way, irresistible tunes and uproarious comedy guarantee a criminally good time.
- May 2021
- May 2021
Footlights Smoker - Easter Term 2021
- May 2021
Fleeing a world he has rejected, Robin finds solace in his music and the sanctuary of his remote family home. But as his kingdom begins to crumble around him, how far will he go to save it and at what cost?
Polly Stenham drags us far into the depths of Robin's mind, unearthing dark family secrets on the way. As the extent of his suffering is slowly revealed and his sanity is called into question, Robin plummets into a spiral of self destruction as he fights to keep his world from falling apart....
- March 2021
N.B. this show has been cancelled
Ever felt like everyone around you is SOOOOO fake? Like you’ve had to pretend to be a better person just to fit in? Well, imagine what it’s like being Henry VIII’s new wife, Katherine Howard! Negotiating court politics, flattering your ageing husband, meeting his daughter who’s EIGHT YEARS OLDER THAN YOU! In fact, you don’t need to imagine - Katherine can tell you herself!!! Let her walk you through the Tudor court and tell it how it is! Don’t worry if she’s a bit vague about her past though - some stones are best left unturned…
- March 2021
Binge-watching Netflix and Disney+ over lockdown has given Show Choir a fabulous idea.......
Bringing some of the most iconic TV and film bops to the ADC stage for a night of dazzling musical fun!
From absolute classics from the likes of Grease and Mamma Mia, to all the cheesy High School Musical and Disney-esque tunes that you’ve come to expect from Show Choir, this will be a Hall of Fame experience like no other!
With slick harmonies and killer choreography, we plan to throw the best Oscars party of the century, so grab your dancing shoes and come along and join us for an hour of hilarious movie-musical fun!
- March 2021
Sleeping Beauty is rudely awoken from her slumber. Marry Prince Charming?! Thanks but no thanks - a better adventure is calling.
Join our hero as you've never seen her before as she enters the world of work under evil bosses, Jake and Will Grimm, and on her very first shift must undertake a dangerous mission to find an escaped Panto Horse and save her colleagues' jobs. She sets off journeying through a series of absurd pantomimes in pursuit of the horse, only to discover that everything is not as it seems...
Sleeping Beauty and her friends must work together, find the horse and ship the baddies off - next day delivery.
- March 2021
Maybe it's a good thing they're tearing down this playground. I mean. The playground means shit. If you forget, you forget, right?'
It is the night before a mosaic Dragon playground is due for demolition in Singapore. Millennial activist Sharon coaxes her cantankerous boyfriend, Hanis, to partake in her Facebook-initiated protest, to which she arrives to realise no one has shown up. Not until an eccentric stranger appears with a tragic, bone-chilling personal story to tell, and Hanis' best pal, Wong who escalates pre-existing tensions and awkwardness through his unfavourable psychoanalysis of Sharon and Hanis' toxic relationship.
What begins as an impassioned night of heritage activism to save a disappearing playground unravels into an existential dramedy that light-heartedly prodes at millennial anxieties of the search for identity and purpose and the insincerity of Singaporean nostalgia in the face of industrial change and progress.
