Human Kindness, Visual Appeals, Courage, and Compassion

Psychology
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Wit Analysis
Vivian's transformation from a life devoted only to knowledge to one devoted to human kindness. When Vivian Bearing is a professor, her arrogance, lack of empathy, and quest for knowledge are displayed. Jason needs to understand that Vivian's arrogance is through in the way she engages with the audience, breaking the fourth wall with lines like "Donne's wit is...a method to see how amazing you are" (Nichols, 2013). After twenty years, I can confidently state that no one is as good as I am. She does admit, though, that she, as the senior scholar, mercilessly denied her wailing students the human kindness she now seeks. She has worked with a student who has requested an extension on a paper due to the death of the student's grandma. Bearing's teacher's death scene moved me in the film. According to Monica, the emotional impact of this other body returning to the stage for that scene is amplified. Jason should be aware of the power of language itself, which is essential to the main character's worldview as a highly theoretical literary intellectual but is only fully realized on stage, where things are best told and partly lost in the film.
I give Nichols credit for incorporating visual appeals. While reading the text, I was reminded of Nichols' early work, and I believe him a master of droll sight gags. Instead of being cheap and schticky, he performs these things in WIT in a thoughtful, kind manner. He makes heavy use of the character's bald head in general, juxtaposing it in the focused foreground with out-of-focus action in the background for tragic, humorous effect. Jason should...