The inaugural Poetry Cup was filmed in September at the Rochester Castle Hotel, Fitzroy as part of the 1989 Spoleto Fringe Festival. Just as the comedy resurgence began in the small cafes and clubs before moving to a wider television audience so then the poets. These people are performers with an emphasis on entertainment. No quiet reads here, but full blooded performance poetry. Their skills have been honed amid beer, smoke, pool players and football, in the back rooms of inner city hotels such as the Provincial, the Rochester, the Leicester Arms and cafes, prisons, schools and the streets.