This is the audio and script of a sketch from the English Teaching Theatre, written by Doug Case and me back in the 1970s. The ETT was a group of actors, teachers and musicians who toured a stage show for learners of English all over the world. What started out as a six-month experiment at International House in London in 1973, turned into a permanent touring company that continued working for 29 years. The ETT did more than 250 tours to 55 different countries, performing to an estimated million students of English. The last tour was to China in March 2002. More than a hundred actors, teachers and musicians worked for the company during that time.
Sketches from the show were first published by Heinemann ELT in two books, Off-Stage (1979) and Further Off-Stage! (1984), and then re-published as photo-copiables, English Sketches 1 and English Sketches 2 in the 1990s.
The photo from the stage show (below) is from Off-Stage. It shows me as the passenger and John Colclough as the ticket inspector. The script pages are from English Sketches 1.
The audio tapes for the first book were recorded by members of the BBC English repertory group of actors, so the voices you will hear in the tape of this sketch were not actually ETT performers. By the time we recorded the second book, we had managed to persuade Heinemann to let actors who had actually performed the sketches on-stage record them.
Feel free to download the audio and the script. I hope you enjoy listening to it and eventually using it with your students.
Ken Wilson's Blog 
Dear Sir
Thank you so much for this recording!
I have so many fantastic memories connected with it. Actually, my first English teacher used it in our classes for beginners. Everybody simply loved “The Ticket Inspector”. Later my students had a lot of fun playing the parts.
I do hope you are doing very well.
Best regards, Anna Milczewska
pt., 29 sty 2021 o 13:02 Ken Wilson’s Blog napisał(a):
> Ken Wilson posted: ” This is the audio and script of a sketch from the > English Teaching Theatre, written by Doug Case and me back in the 1970s. > For those who don’t know, the ETT was a group of actors, teachers and > musicians who toured a stage show for learners of English all” >
Thanks, Anna!
Thank you so much for sharing. Once I played script of ‘Mr. Smith’ (correct me if I’m wrong) telling about a man who won a prize. Besides teaching students to love role-playing, the script is also teaching us some language features.
So lovely if could have the ‘Off Stage (1979)’ for teaching my drama class.
Hope you are doing well.
Best regards,
Rudy Setyawan
I did my RSA prep at IH IN 81, and subsequently used Off Stage for a long time in Italy, Spain, Japan and Malaysia. It was wonderful material, but unfortunately I seem to have misplaced my copy. My favorite sketch was Aldo and Luigi telephoning Sheila (?) to ask if she wanted to go out that evening. Aldo was somewhat brusque whereas Luigi was a very smoooooth operator. Interestingly, my wife always preferred Aldo. She found Luigi a bit slick.
Can you tell me what the sketch was called? And could you share the text? I would love to surprise my wife with it…
Very intersting!
I studied these 15 sketches in 1985 at the British-Senegalese Institute.
I would like to download all the audios to listen to them again and to teach them to my students.
I have already downloaded the first one: “The Ticket Inspector”.
My priorities are: Mr Jones; The Customs Officer; Yoga For Beginners.
I hope you’ll help me get these 2 audios.
Thank you!
Thank you for sharing, Ken.
Thanks, Fikret!
Wonderful Ken! Muitas saudades desse período! Hugs & Kisses to the Wilsons!
Obrigado, Evandro!
Great stuff! I still use this one all the time. Also glad to hear you’re still blogging, Ken.
If I remember correctly there was one with a doctor and a student doctor, too.
Thanks, Alan! re doctor sketch: I will hunt it out – not sure if we recorded that one!
Thanks Ken, it’s amazing to find all this online! Teaching from Spain, we had often used both Off-stage and Further Off-stage. Though last year, we accidently threw out both tapes in a box of old cassettes! Do you think there would be any way we could get our hands on a digital copy?
So great, I loved these as a child. This one was one of my favourites. I also remember the “The Customs Officer”, “The Bank” and “Shakespeare’s House”. Absolutely brilliant.