The Ruling Class (play)

Three of the Earl's sons have already died overseas in the British Empire and the one survivor, Jack, is in a mental institution and thought to be unable to be present.

He has been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic prone to delusions of grandeur, caused or worsened by his time at boarding school, where he felt abandoned and victimized.

Lady Claire also proves obstructive and begins an affair with Jack's psychiatrist Herder to try to persuade him to cure Gurney more quickly.

Herder attempts to achieve this through intensive psychotherapy then - when this fails - resorts to shock therapy on the night that Grace goes into labour.

Sir Charles, still intent on stealing the lordship, sends for a court psychiatrist to evaluate Gurney, confident that his nephew would be sent to an asylum for life.

Now a violent psychopath with a puritanical hatred of women, Gurney murders Sir Charles' wife in a fit of enraged revulsion when she tries to seduce him and frames Tucker (still working for the family) for the crime.