An English playwright, screenwriter, actor and critic of the Establishment. The success of his play Look Back in Anger (1956)transformed English theatre. In a productive life of more than 40 years, he explored many themes and genres, writing for stage, film and TV. His personal life was extravagant and iconoclastic. He was notorious for the ornate violence of his language, not only on behalf of the political causes he supported but also against his own family.

He was one of the first writers to address Britain's purpose in the post-imperial age and to question the point of the monarchy on a prominent public stage. During his peak (1956–1966), he helped make contempt an acceptable onstage emotion, argued for the cleansing wisdom of bad behaviour and bad taste, and combined unsparing truthfulness with devastating wit.