Joe Orton’s Entertaining Mr Sloane has lost none of its bite, and this production leans fully into its wit, perversity, and comic menace. Staged in the round with old, post-war furnitures scattered across the set, the audience is immediately placed in a voyeuristic position – peering in on a household already steeped in odd tensions and emotional disarray. The design is high in production value yet never distracts from the strange intimacy of Orton’s world.
At the centre is Sloane (Jordan Stephens), whose lip-biting and devilish charm mask a more twisted character. The performance captures him as both alluring and unsettling – a man who performs naivety and eagerness to please, but whose control and darker impulses are visible to the audience even as the characters remain blind. He is, in many ways, an unreliable narrator of himself: difficult to fully read, and yet captivating.
The siblings who take him in are equally layered. Kath (Tamzin Outhwaite), a woman broken by the loss of her son, slips easily into a maternal role with Sloane while simultaneously pursuing him sexually. The play is unmistakably Ortonesque in the way it teases out Freudian undercurrents, blurring maternal instinct and sexual desire until mother–son relations become both comic and disturbing. Her brother Ed (Daniel Cerqueira) adds real depth: he reads his sister well, is closeted in his desires, and treats her more like a daughter than an equal – a nod to its time. The dynamic between them is twisted but human, each character craving something – control, comfort, validation – that they cannot quite articulate.
The performances reflect this instability with precision. Outhwaite shows a disarming lightness that makes Kath’s delusions all the more disturbing. She embodies an emotionally unstable woman of her era, deluded yet vulnerable enough that you cannot help but sympathise. Ed, played with striking authority, grounds the piece; his timing, restraint, and tightly coiled energy sharpen every exchange. Their father – Kemp (Christopher Fairbank) – is portrayed with a believable physical deterioration, sniffing out Sloane’s corruption long before the others do.
Orton’s script is both witty and sexually charged, poking fun at English mannerisms while also exploring themes of repression, manipulation, and mental instability. The second act shifts gears: Sloane grows more relaxed, while Kath makes excuses for him and even covers for his behaviour. Their exchanges turn sharper – Sloane snarls “you disgust me” and threatens to leave, his cruelty glossed over by her desperate need to keep him. By this point the groundwork laid in Act 1 erupts into chaos, yet always with humour woven through the grotesque.
The staging makes clever use of lighting and sound: real cigarettes thicken the air, music helps set the period atmosphere, and characters freeze under a green light as others speak, allowing the audience to reflect on their words while signalling how Sloane lingers in everyone’s minds. The stylised theatrical moments are a refreshing break from naturalism, adding suspense and sharpening the play’s edge.
Huge credit to Nadia Fall, who steers this revival with confidence, and to Peter McKintosh, whose set (and costume) design gives every moment an electric edge. Their work lifts the production into something unforgettable — audacious, sharp, and beautifully realised.
Until Saturday 8th November at Young Vic
Running Time: 2 hours 30 mins (including 20-min interval)