It was a game of two halves. First up were the team from Cambridge, rapidly quipping left, right and centre - they would be a tough side to beat. Their material was excellent, set in a pub in the drab seaside village of Hatford Bay - it was as if the League of Gentlemen had found themselves in a Connor MacPherson play. But this was a clever tactic because the narrative of a chance meeting of five weirdos in a pub enabled the cast to introduce their fanciful sketches through the stories each told.
These interludes were hilarious, and the talented quintet slipped from weird reality to even weirder fantasies with the ease and assurance of comics who know they have a very funny script. Ed Weeks - who looks like a less weedy version of Steve Coogan - was impressive as Arthur, the dodgy publican, while Tom Bell, as journalist Harry, was wryly funny as the puzzled stranger in town. As the sex siren Ruby, Ruth Pickett showed she was much more than the token girl on the team, and a hilarious parody of a performance artist from Dan Stevens had the audience hooting with laughter.
Though the enthusiasm and talent of the Oxford Revue performers shone through, their material unfortunately wasn't as strong as the other cast's, which showed all the more as they were second up [...]
Both shows are off to the Edinburgh Festival, and I believe that Cambridge stands a fair chance of being nominated for the Perrier Award again. But as for Oxford - well, at least we won the Boat Race this year.