Born in Birmingham, the flamboyant British critic, essayist and theatrical producer Kenneth Tynan reveled in his enfant terrible literary reputation, and his iconoclastic drama criticism transformed London theater in the fifties. He became the National Theatre’s first literary manager in 1963. When Jack Robinson photographed Tynan for Vogue on April 9, 1969, he had recently staged the notorious taboo-busting hit Oh! Calcutta!, “an affectionate little erotic revue” with its intellectual jokes and contributions from twenty-one authors, including Samuel Beckett, Gore Vidal, Tennessee Williams, John Lennon, and Edna O'Brien, as well as featuring music and copious nudity. Tynan described the show as being for “the person who’s had everything and wants it again.” In a “People Are Talking About …” feature of Vogue, Tynan is described as “a raky Britisher with responsive hands and insolent blue eyes.”