John Osborne It was an ironic situation as Osborne had been playing a dentist in the company's production of Shaw's "You Never Can Tell" and that it was Osborne who had inadvertently introduced them by succumbing to a toothache he attributed to marital woes. This was in the summer of 1955 and Osborne spent much of the next two years before their divorce hoping they would reconcile. In 1956, after "Look Back in Anger" had opened, Osborne met her at the railway station in York, at which meeting she told Osborne of her recent abortion and enquired after his relationship with Mary
John Osborne newly formed English Stage Company at London's Royal Court Theatre. Formed by actor-manager and artistic director George Devine, the company had seen its first three productions flop and urgently needed a success if it was to survive. Devine was prepared to gamble on this play because he saw in it a ferocious and scowling articulation of a new post-war spirit. Osborne was living on a leaky houseboat on the River Thames at the time with Creighton, stewing up nettles from the riverbank to eat. So keen was Devine to contact Osborne that he rowed out to the boat to tell