Such was the perfection with which the young John Kingsley Orton metamorphosed into the fabulous Joe Orton, that sometimes the story of his incandescent biography overshadows the greatness of his work. He landed in this world on January 1, 1933, in Leicester; he was the firstborn of a marriage pissed off with life : Elsie, the mother, had worked in a shoe factory until tuberculosis snatched a lung, and William, the father, showed the same joy of life as the hedges he cared for in Your job as a municipal gardener. The Orton raised their four children with the intention of who signs a pension plan.

To break the tedium of his first office work, the young Orton surrenders himself to the theater, discovering his vocation. He locks himself in libraries, takes courses to soften the accent, sculpts his body with a dumbbell punch . The stars were conjured to coincide with Kenneth Halliwell, seven years older than him, at the Royal School of Dramatic Arts in London in 1951. A family inheritance - Halliwell's mother had died from a wasp sting, when he was a Children allow them to live together and dedicate themselves to what destiny had chosen them for. As in a fever, they love and write , but publishers reject those written with four hands. The novel ends The last days of Sodom in 1957. It is also ignored, so they decide to try it separately.

In 1959 they rented an apartment of 20 square meters at 25 Noal Road, in the Islington neighborhood. The inheritance is ending and they subsist on barely five pounds a week. They subtract books from the local library, intervene them - modifying them with extraordinary collages - and return them. They are discovered and found guilty of theft and "malicious damage . " They spend six months imprisoned in different prisons. It is the first and last time they have been so long without seeing each other.

In 1963, the BBC pays Orton 65 pounds for the radio broadcast of his work The Ruffian on the Staircase . Confident, send a copy of Entertaining Mr. Sloane to the theatrical agent Peggy Ramsay. The premiere in 1964 divides criticism between praise and contempt, but he has already reached popularity. His pieces explore the moral misery of the popular classes , far from the idealized portrait of other authors. To talk about the suburb, to portray it, it is necessary to have been born there and suffered. The payroll of his theater is made up of greedy housewives, corrupt policemen, heartless chaperos and grave robbers. Create a playwright looking for the laugh of the viewer to immediately disengage his jaw. The following Orton assemblies follow the tonic of ups and downs at the reception. A production of The Booty in 1966 gives the right tone and reaps great criticism. Then check the ruffian on the stairs for his theatrical premiere, write The Erpingham Camp , and make a script for The Beatles called Up against it .

Apparently, the couple enjoys the success of Orton, but the discussions follow one another. Halliwell suffers from strange diseases: chest pains or skin pigmentations. He is dedicated to making collages and correcting the works of his companion turned into a shining star. On December 20, 1966, Orton began writing a diary in which he gave an account of his hectic sex life and the tribulations of the trade: «I bought the newspapers. Criticisms nothing good. [...] Luckily, last night I fucked well . Something I have taken from my return to London, ”he writes on June 7, 1967. Orton leaves the pages with the detailed account of his scuba diving inside a veined red leather folder within reach of Halliwell; The latter, whose direct influence and intervention in Orton's texts were decisive for his success, now feels a amortized character and about to undertake the mutis.

On August 9, 1967, the driver of Paul McCartney goes to take the playwright to a meeting with The Beatles. No one opens the door. The police find Orton with the skull busted by nine hammers. The hammer was next to him, on the quilt, and in the center of the room, Kenneth's body. He had died from the intake of 20 Nembutal pills. The police found Kenneth's next note: “Everything will become clear when they read the newspaper. Especially the last part » . Two years later, what the butler saw , the last piece that Orton left written would be released.

The days after the crime, the families decide to respect the will of the lovers. Joe's sister took a handful of ashes from each urn to mix them and said, "A little Joe and a little Kenneth . " Peggy, the agent, could not contain himself and exclaimed: "Dear, this is not a recipe." A final scene worthy of Orton himself.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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