In conclusion, the Revues of Oxford and Durham were good and the Footlights of Cambridge were totally forgetable.

Durham's bit was packed full of the kind of trendy popular surrealism that I enjoy but can get a little samey after, say, an hour. There were some excellent sketches though, with the final one as two colonialist recounting their river boat story being the best ("Jesus didn't have arrows in his hand", "He had nails"). The influence of Ricky Gervais is kind of incredible.

Even now, I can not remember one standout Footlights sketch. Their scenes meandered without an actual purpose, but not in an anarchic Python (or "good") way. Best thing was the opening MC with his conscience bit - that's not a good thing.

The Revue impressed me by actually building up stories and scenes in their sketches, something Durham don't do, preferring instead to build around wierd quirks, gags or outrageous characters. The park bench sketch was beautiful, without any gags or punchline, and was completely absorbing. I still love the Welsh cavern tour sketch, and thought the Hitler sketch was great. The end started to drag a lot until the finale - I do not like the Stalin sketch, regardless of how many references are thrown in, and the same can be said for the Roald Dahl skit and the Derren Brown one - which was utterly fantastic and rescued the show from what could have otherwise been a tepid ending. It was atually quite a long finale, with the chat around the table, before lauching into, almost out of nowhere, a song about Condi Rice exactly over the top enough to bring the whole room to ovation and remind everyone how good Revue comedy can be. King-sized.