Behan Complete Plays (World Classics)

This review is of the first play in the book, The Quare Fellow. I highly recommend The Quare Fellow, the first play in the collection. I would like to see it performed. Behan's writing skills are comparable to those of Frank McCourt, author of Angela's Ashes: first rate. I am not reviewing the entire collection because I haven't read it due to time limitations.

Tragic, brutal things happen to the characters in these plays. But none of these people is particularly likeable, so you can't really care. It's all just as well for them, in some ways, and it's all in good fun. The characters manipulate each other, lie to each other, steal from each other, screw each other, kill each other, and deny that they do it. Everyone here has the ethics of a doorknob, and it's all pretty enjoyable.The last one, "What The Butler Saw", got a little bit too ridiculously farcical for my taste and went on too long, but it has its moments; and otherwise they're all pretty good to read. I can also recommend the introduction. Joe Orton lived his own life very much like the people in his plays (which makes you wonder how much of his material was supposed to be comedy). Even his death was true to form: his envious lover, actor Kenneth Halliwell, bashed in Orton's brains with a hammer just prior to doing himself in with 22 sleeping tablets.

This collection of (the late) Joe Orton's plays is amazing. Not for those who are easily offended or whose feelings are hurt. Orton, who was described as a "poor Oscar Wilde," lived up to the name. His plays are fast paced assults on everything that the British hold dear. There is no respect for religion, custom, death or social norms.Satirical and full of quick wit, Orton's plays attack British culture and spit on everything that the "respectable person," would hold dear.Orton does not hold back anything and could come on a bit strong for a conservative reader, but my suggestion is that any lover of drama and theater should own and read these plays.

Beaten to death by his male lover in 1967, Joe Orton has been rediscovered as an intriguing look into the mind and soul of a man who lived ahead of his times. His plays are fascinating and have so many layers that you can enjoy them repeatedly. He also wrote a screenplay for the Beatles, which was never filmed (according to the dustjacket). Now wouldn't that be interesting!

Jo Orton died tragically in his mid thirties, the plays in this collection are now as old as he was when he wrote them and the fact that they still stand the test of time is credit to their sheer, for want of a better word; 'genius'. If you ever wondered where The League Of Gentlemen, Python and so on took there inspiration from, here is your answer. Characters ranging from ludicrous to even more so, plots so confusing and bizarre they require re-reading, this book will always throw up something new everytime you read it, and then dare you to try and make sense of any of it. If you have a passion for traditional, Shakespearian plays then you should look elsewhere, because it is clear that Joe Orton didn't. Every rule broken, every side split, this is the genre defining pinnacle that contemporary theatre will never again reach. A real moment in history that you need to own. Trust me.