Tell him to put his trousers on. Cantering around the house with a bare bum . . . Can’t leave you alone for five minutes.

When lonely Kath offers the mysterious Mr Sloane a room to rent in the family home, her businessman brother Ed does not approve. After all, what will people say? But soon, he becomes equally taken with the charismatic young Sloane. Only their old Dadda remains wary, convinced that he recognises this stranger. What begins as a convenient living arrangement spirals into a dangerous game of desire and deceit.

Joe Orton’s 1964 cult classic brims with manipulation, seduction, and a devilish wit.

This edition was published to coincide with the revival in September 2025 at London's Young Vic.

Entertaining Mr Sloane retains its power to provoke and startle. It is a truly amoral piece, wild, witty and utterly heartless. * Daily Telegraph *
This is a play that has dated no more than The Importance of Being Earnest. * The TImes *
The play's language, with its sly double entendres and surreal subversiveness, remains distinctive, crying out for liberation from the restrictive social context of its original creation. * Metro *

Joe Orton (1933-1967) was an English playwright noted for his black comedies, which combine genteel dialogue with violent and shocking action. He delighted in shocking audiences by breaking taboos surrounding sexuality and death in conventionally structured 'black' farces involving epigrammatic dialogue and frenetic, convoluted plots. His plays include Entertaining Mr Sloane (1964), Loot (1965) and What the Butler Saw (1969).