Legs & Co. was a dance troupe created in 1976 for the BBC's weekly Top of the Pops programme. They had made over three hundred appearances on this show by the time of their last performance in 1981. The group then continued for four further years on tour. The six-girl dance troupe replaced Ruby Flipper on Top of the Pops, representing a reversion to the earlier all-female format for troupes on this show, and covering the time period when the disco, punk and new wave music fashions were at their chart peak.
Top of the Pops dance troupe history Legs & Co. were the fourth dance troupe to perform on the BBC's Top of The Pops. The tenure of the first group, the Go-Jos, ran from 1964 to 1968, with Pan's People then taking over until April 1976. This group was choreographed for their entire existence by Flick Colby, who was also initially a dancer in the troupe. Ruth Pearson performed as one of the dancers in this group throughout its run on the programme, retiring when the group was replaced.
Pan's People were succeeded by Ruby Flipper, a mixed-gender and mixed-race group, choreographed by Colby and managed by Pearson. This group's short run was terminated in October 1976. Audience research by the producers indicated Ruby Flipper were not popular amongst its TV audience. Colby formed a new group, again managed by herself and Pearson, retaining the remaining three female dancers from Ruby Flipper and adding three new dancers following auditions. This replacement was the group that came to be known as Legs & Co.
Due to improvements in the BBC archival process and the increase in off-air recordings from the mid-1970s, unlike the previous three groups, all performances at least partially survive with the vast bulk complete.
Legs & Co. on Top of the Pops Initial line-up and name The three remaining female Ruby Flipper members were retained for the new group. These were: Lulu Cartwright, in her second troupe following her stint in Ruby Flipper Patti Hammond, who started her career in the Royal Ballet, before moving into modern and TV dancing, including appearing with the Second Generation Sue Menhenick, who was in her third Top of the Pops dance troupe, having also been a member of Pan's People and Ruby Flipper. Following a set of auditions, the following dancers were added: Rosemary Hetherington, a student at the Italia Conti stage school Pauline Peters, who had appeared on stage in various West End productions and in the dance troupe Young Generation Gill Clark, the runner-up in the Miss Great Britain 1976 contest - added as the sixth and last member after the final audition.
By the time of the new troupe's first appearance on Top of the Pops on 21 October 1976, dancing to the Average White Band's "Queen of My Soul", the group was still unnamed. For their first appearances, they were introduced as the "Top of the Pops" dancers, while their name was listed as "??????" on the end credits of three editions. The BBC decided to allow viewers to select a name for the new dance troupe via a competition promoted on Top of the Pops by Ed Stewart before the girls made their dancing debut, and on the BBC children's programme Blue Peter. The name "Legs & Co." was chosen as the successful name. This was announced on the Top of the Pops of 4 November 1976, with the competition winner in attendance, Elaine Coombes.
Performances on the show Style As with all dance troupes on Top of the Pops, Legs & Co. performed routines to songs of various musical styles, reflecting what was in the charts at the time. While these performances would often include dance records, for example disco and soul music, less dance-orientated musical styles were also included including tracks from Punk bands such as the Sex Pistols and The Clash, novelty songs and in the final year, medley songs.
The costumes were made specially for each performance, with the designs created by Flick Colby and the dress designer each Thursday for the next show. Whilst in the vast bulk of performances contemporary costumes were used, humour was occasionally used resulting in unconventional costumes including dressing as boxers, babies and a camel.
Production schedule There was a rigid production schedule for the group necessitated by Top of the Pops being a weekly chart show.
The typical schedule for a recorded Top of the Pops was as follows:
Wednesday: The show was recorded at Television Centre including the Legs & Co. segment. A track was selected the same evening for the following week's show by the producer, occasionally giving Flick Colby a limited choice. Thursday: The performance for the new track had staging and costumes planned by Flick Colby with the staging and costume managers. The show based on the previous day's recording was broadcast. Monday: Usually, the first day of rehearsing at the BBC North Acton rehearsal studios, with choreography created through the rehearsals, and costume fitting in the afternoon. Occasionally, the rehearsing could begin the previous Friday. Tuesday: Charts released. Either second day of rehearsal of the planned track, or a new track was selected if the prechosen one was no longer required for the show, and the new track was choreographed, staged, costumed and rehearsed. A new track was a common occurrence, once with 5 editions in a row requiring new tracks. Wednesday: There was a non-costumed studio run through in the late morning with cameras (and band, if a band was involved). The full show dress rehearsal was done in the late afternoon in Television Centre. The performance itself was recorded with the studio audience in the evening. Normally it was done in two takes with close-ups in the second take. Due to the studio schedule, there was often no opportunity for further takes and so minor errors were often kept in the edited version.
The troupe could also rehearse for and perform up to three cabaret performances prior to the following Monday.
By 1981, Top of the Pops began going out live on occasion, with three live editions, 7 May 1981, 9 July 1981 and 3 September 1981 including three performances on each date by Legs & Co.
Archive status The BBC only holds in their library master tapes for all Top of the Pops episodes broadcast after 8 September 1977, with only partial coverage up to this date. Nine editions in the Legs & Co era do not have master tapes in the BBC library, though all missing performances survive either in off-air recordings or master copies, though not all are complete. The following table shows for each year the number of performances on the show, the number of repeats of these performances, and the number of wiped performances, with totals on the bottom row.
Year Performances Repeat bbc-wiped 1976 15 0 4 1977 66 8 5 1978 64 9 0 1979 58 7 0 1980 48 5 0 1981 71 8 0 Total 322 37 9
The episodes not in the BBC archive are: Date Performances Availability 11 November 1976 Hank C Burnette – Spinning Rock Boogie 90 seconds only survives from a copy of a master tape, the official naming of the group was on this episode and is lost. 18 November 1976 Peter Frampton – Do You Feel Like We Do 69 seconds only survives from a copy of a master tape. 2 December 1976 Queen – Somebody to Love Off-air exists 16 December 1976 The Stylistics – You'll Never Get To Heaven Off-air exists 10 February 1977 Heatwave – Boogie Nights Off-air exists 3 March 1977 David Bowie – Sound And Vision Off-air exists 31 March 1977 David Soul – Going in with My Eyes Open Off-air exists - played as part of BBC4 rerun 4 August 1977 Candi Staton – Nights on Broadway Off-air exists 8 September 1977 Jean Michel Jarre – Oxygene Off-air exists
Performances outside the show in this era As well as their regular appearances on Top of the Pops, Legs & Co. as a full group appeared on other productions of the time including: BBC TV's Jim'll Fix It in 1978 as part of a viewer's 'Fix It'. The film The Stud in 1978, dancing to a performance by The Real Thing BBC TV's Blue Peter in 1979 – the troupe danced to Mike Oldfield's arrangement of the programme's theme tune. The 1979 British Rock and Pop Awards dancing to a medley of 1978 hits ATV's Tiswas, in 1980 as both guests and performers. BBC internal Christmas tapes, produced by production staff
They also did cabaret at the weekends as this fitted into their production schedule; however, they had to remain predominantly UK-based during their Top of the Pops era due to the need to be rehearsing for the show each Monday. Sue Menhenick recalled "As legs & co progressed more with cabaret, [our] shows became more of a 'show' rather than just 'a routine and then someone else would come on', which was the case with Pan's People sometimes, so we did more of a running show." By 1980, they had a 45-minute set.
Additional dancers Change in line-up The original Legs & Co. line-up ran from October 1976 to 19 March 1981, when Pauline Peters left the group. She was replaced on 28 May 1981 by singer and dancer Anita Chellamah following auditions. Frances Ruffelle was an unsuccessful applicant.
The first performance of this new line-up was to Ain't No Stopping by Enigma. The second line-up lasted until the end of the group's tenure on Top of the Pops.
Other dancers Though the seven Legs & Co. dancers never had stand-ins, on several occasions other dancers appeared together with Legs & Co. on Top of the Pops, shown in the following table. The additional dancer(s) accompanied the full troupe in each case unless otherwise stated.
Date Dancer Track Artist Credited (Y/N) 23 December 1976 Floid Pearce "I Wish" Stevie Wonder N 25 December 1976 6 unknown (in animal costumes) "Jungle Rock" Hank Mizell N 14 April 1977 Floid Pearce "Lonely Boy" Andrew Gold N 16 June 1977 Floid Pearce "You're Gonna Get Next To Me" Bo Kirkland and Ruth Davis N 11 August 1977 Floid Pearce "I Feel Love" Donna Summer N 25 December 1977 Floid Pearce "Sir Duke" Stevie Wonder N 25 May 1978 Floid Pearce "Let's Go Disco" The Real Thing N 25 May 1978 Floid Pearce "You're the One That I Want" John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John N 21 September 1978 Floid Pearce "You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)" Sylvester N 19 October 1978 Martin (with Patti Hammond) "Sandy" John Travolta N 25 December 1978 Floid Pearce + 5 other males "Summer Nights" John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John N 13 August 1981 Alex (with Gill Clark) "How Deep Is Your Love" section of Startrax Club Disco StarTrax Y 24 September 1981 Jeremy (with Lulu Cartwright) "Endless Love" Lionel Richie Y
In latter-day radio and newspaper interviews and two books claims have been made that an additional dancer appeared in Legs & Co. during their Top of the Pops tenure variously as a full member, a two-time contributor, or in an unspecified precursor of the group. However, there is no independent evidence for any further female dancers from either primary BBC sources or the shows themselves. In addition, an original member stated "[she] was never ... in Legs and Co, either in cabaret with us or appearing on TOTPs".
Timeline The following displays the timeline for Top of the Pops dancers between 1974 and 1983, showing the transition of dancers between the troupes. This is a complete list, with the following exceptions and notes:
Other than those who appeared in previous troupes, Zoo dancers are not shown – the performances by previous troupe members are shown individually rather than as a time period. Non-troupe dancers brought in by individual acts for other performances on Top of the Pops are not listed Audience participants are not listed The Pan's People Jungle Rock animal performers are assumed to be the dancers themselves therefore not indicated with 'Others'. The Legs & Co Jungle Rock animal performers are listed though their professional status is unknown, they are listed as 'Others' DJs are not listed where they appeared in a dance Ruth Pearson's appearance on 'Harvest for the World' on 22 July 1976 is shown