It is 50 years since Hollywood superstars Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor took time out of their busy schedules to perform for no money in a student production. What was behind the grand gesture and what do people remember of these unlikely events today?
Now, it would be the equivalent of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie ditching the glamour of their A-list existences for the modest stage of a local amateur dramatics club - and the British couple's return to the UK was described by the BBC at the time as providing a dose of "knockout voltage" glamour.
Burton had agreed to play the title role in Oxford University Dramatic Society's February 1966 production of Dr Faustus to thank Prof Nevill Coghill, who two decades earlier had championed Burton's acting talent when the young Welshman had a brief stint studying English at the university's Exeter College.
Remarkably, Taylor's non-speaking role in the play as Helen of Troy marked her stage debut.
During the week the play was staged, the celebrated couple, who had married two years previously, welcomed their undergraduate co-stars into their social world.
"They took over a floor of The Randolph [hotel] where they would entertain every night, and that was great fun," said Jackie Keirs, a student choreographer and dancer in the play.
At the time Taylor described her involvement in the production as "sort of like a giggle, really, for me to do".
"She would come into the wings with her wardrobe lady, her hairdresser, her make-up lady, her bodyguard - then she would come across the stage, Burton would kiss her, [then she would] come out of the other wings and be carried back to her dressing room by the same group of people," said Keirs.
The atmosphere surrounding the event was "electric", said Don Chapman, former drama critic at the Oxford Mail.
"Everybody wanted to get a ticket for it."