.The Story So Far....
The Edinburgh Unversity Footlights Society was founded in 1989 as an amateur, student-run musical theatre group affiliated with Edinburgh University. Footlights' founders identified a gap in the creative output of the Edinburgh University performing societies and a need for a society dedicated to performing modern musicals; the Edinburgh University Theatre Company (Bedlam) concentrated on "straight" acting (although musical EUTC productions were not unknown before the 1980s) and the Savoy Opera Group performed only Gilbert and Sullivan light operas. Footlights' first production was a devised musical called Kelvin which ran at the Edinburgh University George Square Theatre in March 1990.
In 1991, the Footlights Committee decided to encourage participation from outside Edinburgh University and the Society was renamed "The Edinburgh Footlights Theatre Company". The Edinburgh Footlights Theatre Company's greatest artistic success was its 1994 production of Moby Dick; the only amateur performance of the 1990s musical licensed by theatre producer Cameron Mackintosh himself.
In 1994, Footlights was re-established as the "Edinburgh University Footlights Society". The change back to Footlights' original name signalled a move back to the society's original focus on developing the musical theatre skills of Edinburgh University students. For the next eight years the Church Hill Theatre in Morningside hosted a string of successful February productions, classics like Chicago, Cabaret and West Side Story being but a few. Footlights also took productions of Little Shop of Horrors (1996) and Birth of a Man (1997 - a world premiere) to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
In 2002, the Committee decided to move Footlights' productions to the heart of Edinburgh University at George Square Theatre (where Footlights' first production had taken place in 1989). The huge success of Fame was followed by Hair and, most recently, Guys and Dolls.
The nature of being a University Society means that the membership of Footlights is constantly in flux. New members bring new experiences and ideas, and the dynamism and creativity at the heart of Footlights means that the future of the Society is never set in stone...
