Dutch Elm Conservatoire
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The Dutch Elm Conservatoire is a British sketch comedy group, made up of four writers and actors: Stephen Evans, Jim Field Smith, Rufus Jones,and Renton Skinner. A fifth member, Jordan Long left in September 2006 to pursue other projects. They perform on the comedy circuit in London, Edinburgh and on tour. In 2005 they were nominated for the Perrier Award. The troupe first met together as a five towards the end 2002, with their stage debut in February 2003.
Subsequent to this, the BBC commissioned them to record a BBC Radio 4 pilot. The resulting script, CONSPIRACY, was then developed for the stage. They took this new live show back to the Edinburgh Fringe in August 2005, again at the Pleasance Courtyard playing to sell-out audiences and picking up a Perrier Award nomination and a rare 5-star review from the Scotsman, amongst others. The show was directed by Ed Curtis. On returning to London they performed the show to a sell-out West End audience, and early in 2006 they embarked on their first UK Tour which finished in March 2006. As a group, the Dutch Elm Conservatoire have appeared on various TV and radio programmes, including Loose Ends, The Milk Run and 28 Acts in 28 Minutes (all for the BBC). However, the four of them are busy actors and writers in their own right, with an extensive range of credits for screen, stage and radio. Between them, they have infiltrated almost every new comedy series of recent years on British television , including Hyperdrive (BBC), Nighty Night (BBC), Snuff Box (BBC), Mike Bassett: Manager (ITV), Secret Smile (ITV), The Office (BBC), My Life in Film(BBC), The Robinsons (BBC), According to Bex (BBC), The Only Boy for Me (ITV), Peep Show (Channel 4), My Family (BBC), Coupling (BBC), Extras (BBC), Love Soup (BBC), Fear of Fanny (BBC), 15 Storeys High (BBC) and Bedsitcom (Channel 4), not to mention films and radio. They also crop up frequently in voice-overs, commercials and corporate work in Britain and abroad, and have writing credits across all the major terrestrial and digital channels.
They last performed as a five at the August 2006 Edinburgh Fringe and the Belfast theatre festival (Nov '06), with a show entitled Dutch Elm Conservatoire in Prison.
For 2008 they are writing a sketch show as The Dutch Elm Conservatoire for television ( ITV2 ), and a new sketch show for the stage. The Dutch Elm Conservatoire could recently be seen performing on the new BBC Three comedy show entitled Comedy Shuffle. They can also be heard on BBC Radio 4's forthcoming series of 28 Acts in 28 Minutes and seen on television in the Paramount Comedy Channel's Short Cuts. They will also be appearing in the second series of Comedy Cuts for ITV2 in March 2008.
