RESEARCHING THEATRE AND PERFORMANCE
Poster for 'What The Butler Saw' by Joe Orton, Lindsay Anderson, 1975
'What the Butler Saw'
Theatre Poster
Lindsay Anderson and Yves Simard
London, England
1975
Photo-Lithograph
This poster was for the Royal Court Theatre's 1975 revival of Joe Orton's play 'What The Butler Saw'. This was Joe Orton's last play, and was not produced in the West End until 1969 at the Queen's Theatre, two years after Joe Orton was murdered by Kenneth Halliwell. The original production had a star cast including Ralph Richardson, Stanley Baker and Coral Brown, but the play was not well received by the critics who dismissed it as 'filth'. The play's reputation was not restored until this 1975 revival at the Royal Court, directed by Lindsay Anderson.
Theatre Poster
Lindsay Anderson and Yves Simard
London, England
1975
Photo-Lithograph
This poster was for the Royal Court Theatre's 1975 revival of Joe Orton's play 'What The Butler Saw'. This was Joe Orton's last play, and was not produced in the West End until 1969 at the Queen's Theatre, two years after Joe Orton was murdered by Kenneth Halliwell. The original production had a star cast including Ralph Richardson, Stanley Baker and Coral Brown, but the play was not well received by the critics who dismissed it as 'filth'. The play's reputation was not restored until this 1975 revival at the Royal Court, directed by Lindsay Anderson.
The play is a farce set in a psychiatric clinic and this poster is as irreverent as the play itself. It was designed by the director Lindsay Anderson as a photo-collage, a reference to Orton's own liking for collage, which resulted in a prison sentence after he and his partner Kenneth Halliwell once defaced library books to make collages. It must be the only poster ever to feature Winston Churchill, the Queen, a television, nuns and Concorde!