What the Butler Saw

What the Butler Saw is a farcical play by English playwright, John Kingsley “Joe” Orton. First performed in 1969, after Orton’s death, the play is about a doctor in a psychiatric home who tries to seduce the woman he wants for a secretary, and their attempts to hide an incident during the interview. The play was Orton’s attempt to revive comedy and farce in theatre at the time. Orton is remembered for his daring attempts to shock and amuse audiences; darkly farcical modern plays are known as “Ortonesque.” His first novel, Head to Toe, was published posthumously.

There are only two acts in What the Butler Saw, but the action is continuous throughout and the division is more for stage convenience than a plot break or set changes. The play is set primarily in the examination room within a private clinic.

The main character is Dr. Prentice. He runs a private medical clinic in England. What most people don’t know is that this is no ordinary medical practice, but an exclusive mental institution. The clinic is generally in chaos because there aren’t enough staff, and Dr. Prentice tends to let patients do whatever they feel like. However, this is a big day for the clinic. Dr. Rance, a local inspector, is due to visit. He’s undertaking a government inspection on short notice, and Dr. Prentice doesn’t know if he’ll pass it or not.



As if this isn’t enough for Dr. Prentice to worry over, he’s trying to recruit a new secretary for the surgery. He’s interviewing a prospective candidate, Geraldine Barclay, but he can’t concentrate on the interview because he’s very attracted to her. She tells him all about how she recently lost her adoptive mother in a gas explosion, and he offers to comfort her. She doesn’t pick up on the implied meaning and keeps talking.

Dr. Prentice tries to listen to Geraldine and ask the right questions. She tells him that she doesn’t know who her real parents are, and it’s always bothered her. Dr. Prentice thinks she’s had a terrible time, but he takes advantage of this. He tells her that she’s an ideal candidate for the job, but the interview has a few stages. Intrigued, Geraldine keeps listening.

Geraldine is asked by Dr. Prentice to strip because what she looks like in her underwear is part of the procedure. Geraldine is horrified but agrees to do it because she needs a job. She also assumes Dr. Prentice, given his position, is trustworthy, and she’s attracted to him. She wants to undress behind the privacy curtain, but Dr. Prentice insists she undresses in front of him.



As Geraldine undresses, Dr. Prentice hears his wife coming along the corridor. He panics and makes Geraldine gather up her clothes and get behind the curtain. He follows her because he doesn’t want to deal with his wife, but she walks in before he can hide. Dr. Prentice wants to know who the young man is that is with her. Mrs. Prentice explains that this is Nicholas Beckett, a boy who raped her in a nearby hotel, and he’s blackmailing her.

Dr. Prentice knows his wife slept with Nicholas willingly because she’s always cheating on him, but Dr. Rance arrives before he can react. He begins his inspection, and he’s not impressed. He wants to have every one of them committed as patients because they’re practicing “democratic lunacy.” Dr. Prentice loses control over the situation; he needs to get it back.

As secretaries at the time are typically female, he has Nicholas dress up as a woman to pretend he’s a candidate. He also makes his wife pretend to be a candidate—all of this is to distract them from looking behind the curtain and seeing Geraldine standing there, still in nothing but her underwear.



Nicholas isn’t happy, but he goes along with it for now. He’s still blackmailing Mrs. Prentice, and out of Dr. Prentice’s earshot, she offers him the secretary job to shut him up. This pacifies him, and he promises not to blackmail her anymore. Meanwhile, Geraldine hears all of this, and she’s incensed because she feels taken advantage of.

Geraldine emerges from behind the curtain. She recognizes a locket Nicholas is wearing as the matching half of her own. Mrs. Prentice sees the locket and says it’s one she lost during a brief encounter in a hotel before she got married. It turns out the locket belongs to Mr. Prentice, who gave it to her—they had had a drunken liaison the pair don’t remember until now. As such, Nicholas and Geraldine are their children.

Everyone is oddly fascinated by this turn of events. Dr. Rance looks around the rest of the clinic, deciding at the end of the play that there’s only one thing he can do—turn the things he’s seeing into a book.



What the Butler Saw uses caricatured stereotypical characters to mock typical middle-class English propriety and to show how hypocritical it is. The idea is to show the difference between madness and sanity is only a matter of perspective—it’s on us to decide what’s normal. During its earliest performances, audiences were shocked and appalled by the sexual content and vulgarity. The play still divides modern theatergoers.