Free stage school to be held at Pendle Footlights in Nelson
Children will have the chance to try out a new stage school in Nelson and for the co-founder it is an endorsement that he has beaten an illness that hospitalised him for months.
The free Stage School open day will be held at Pendle Footlights on Saturday January 31st at 9-30am at Pendle Vale College, Oxford Road, Nelson.
Footlights Pendle, which has franchises in Rochdale and Rossendale, is co-owned by Aaron and Jack Doherty-Tubb.
They took on their first Footlights franchise in Rossendale in April 2018 when they only had one base at Haslingden Sixth Form.
In the middle of Covid, they made the brave decision to take over a unit at Toll Bar in Stacksteads to develop their own classroom spaces, while still retaining use of Haslingden.
However, Aaron’s health was severely impacted in 2023 and he found himself hospitalised from July to December when tonsilitis led to abscesses and he was tube-fed for 130 days.
He said: “I had to have a major lung operation and faced massive recuperation. At one point, I did think I would never get back to full health and it impacted my mental health. I was holding Zoom meetings while I was in the intensive care unit; the nurses did tell me off for that.”
His recovery was slow, and it was only in April 2025 that Aaron returned to being full time face-to-face.
He added: “In 2023 our numbers decreased to 48 after Covid, now we have 270 across all three franchises.”
The company employs 32 people across Rossendale, Rochdale and Pendle.
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