John Osborne (1929-1994), British playwright and film screenplay writer. Osborne's Look Back in Anger (1956), about rebellion against traditional mores, is regarded as a landmark in post-World War II British drama and made its author famous as the first of the “angry young men” (see English Literature). The Entertainer (1957) presents the decline of Britain's place in the world through the metaphor of the stage. Luther (1961) is a historical drama in which the central figure is seen as a true rebel. Inadmissible Evidence (1964) resumes Osborne's attack on contemporary values, and West of Suez (1971) is a depiction of Britain's past imperial glories in which he shows sympathy for the colonizer. Osborne's screenplay for the 1963 film Tom Jones won an Academy Award. His autobiography, A Better Class of Person (1981), recalls with bitterness his lower middle-class origins and his relationship with his mother. His work is significant for its reorientation of British drama from plays depicting upper-class life to realistic drama of contemporary life.