It’s Exam Term.  There’s no chance you can say “Oh no it isn’t!” because the Panto is months away.  The tell-tale signs are already emerging.  The queues are getting longer for the college cafeteria, because everybody is learning so much that to make mental space they’ve forgotten how to cook, or even assemble bread and hummus.  People are turning simple ‘Hello, how are you?’ conversations into exaggerated auctions of how many hours they’ve spent in the library.  And yet the theatre world carries on, albeit streamlined to the ADC and Corpus Playroom, at the expense of college societies.  Still, how does it manage it?

Firstly, there’s Prelims.  None of the above applies to English or History first years.  Prelims count for less than Part I or Part IIA exams, which count for nothing – except maybe pride if you’re into that sort of thing.  Not only do they just have Prelims to worry about, often taken in the comfort of the college library, but they have already finished.  For them this is just a normal term, except with more sunshine/rain (delete as appropriate).  Thankfully, they tend to be artistic and socially responsible types, who realise it is their duty to donate their free time to entertaining the rest of us by keeping the Cambridge theatre world going.

But what about all the non-first-year-English/History students who are involved with plays this term?  These people are the second reason the Cambridge theatre show carries on, and divide into two groups: those who are just too good and those who just don’t care.  The leads in Hamlet will have to learn more lines than some of us will course material over the next month.  There are people who are just so ridiculously talented that they’ll get a First despite playing the lead in every ADC show, this term and throughout the year.  Others have realised that there’s more to life than exams, or that they’re much better at acting than exams, in which case they may as well play to their strengths.

There’s certainly no let up in the variety.  It’s only week 1, and on these pages we’ve got pieces on a play in a toilet, some new writing about sheep and a production of an obscure Woody Allen play.  And so it continues for the first four weeks of term.  Then we hit week 5.  Everybody’s complaints suggest this is bad enough in the other two terms without needing to add in the start of the exam period. 

But skipping over cramming, exams, and snarling up the city centre with celebrations, next stop is the May Week shows.  If you’re up in time to see any of these then you are probably doing May Week wrong.  But if by some accident you do find yourself awake in the middle of the day, then plays in gardens and on punts have produced some of the most hilariously un(der)-rehearsed performances ever.

Also in May Week are the Previews for the Footlights Tour Show.  This one’s in the evenings, so it’s a good place to go relieve your sulks if you’re not going to the ball.  They tend to experiment, and it’s always interesting to see how well and how much things have changed when they bring it back at the start of Michaelmas – if you’re coming back, that is.