John Kingsley Orton (1933-1967) had a meteoric rise in British theater, with three hit plays produced in the 1960s.

John Kingsley (Joe) Orton was born in Leicester on January 1, 1933, the oldest of four children of a working-class family. His father was a low-paid gardener for the city; his mother worked in a hosiery factory until vision problems made it necessary for her to leave that job, after which she became a charwoman.

Although the family was not a close-knit one emotionally, the older son was his mother's favorite, and after Orton completed his required schooling she arranged to have him attend a commercial college, where he was a student from 1945 to 1947.

It was in 1949 that he developed the desire to act, or at least to be involved in the theater in some capacity. He joined the Leicester Dramatic Society and two other local drama groups, but was cast...