The group received a Perrier Award nomination at the 1984 Edinburgh Festival, and went on to be nominated three times for the Olivier Award for Best Entertainment (1995, 2000 and 2004), and twice for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revue (2005 and 2010). Keane and Anderson were also nominated for the 2010 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics. Their name is derived from the expletive exclamation 'F**king Ada!', which appears in the text of Alan Bennett's play "The History Boys" (2004), and is also the name of a song by Ian Dury.