Critic Peter John Dyer called A Taste of Honey "tart and lively round the edges and bitter at the core." It's a well-acted 1961story of a working-class young British woman who has an affair with a black sailor and becomes pregnant. A homosexual friend proves more helpful than her loose-living mother. Controversial for its time, the powerful drama was adapted for the screen by writer Shelagh Delaney and director Tony Richardson from Shelagh's London and Broadway play. Rita Tushingham made her debut in the starring role. Its black comic tone and taboo subject matter were ahead of their time, and it presaged such later studies of biracial love as To Sir With Love and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. Herb Alpert's instrumental version of the theme song was a huge international hit.