Show Plot Harvey

Authors: Mary Chase

Time Period: 1940s

Setting: The Dowd family mansion and Chumley’s Rest (a local mental health sanatorium)

Summary:  Elwood P. Dowd is a kind, mild-mannered, and cheerful gentleman whose best friend is Harvey—an invisible, six-foot-one-and-a-half inch-tall pooka shaped like a rabbit. He cheerfully introduces Harvey to everyone he meets, which mortifies his high-society sister, Veta Louise, and her daughter, Myrtle Mae.  Veta tries to have Elwood committed to Chumley’s Rest, but when the doctors try to "cure" him, they end up questioning their own sanity and the value of rigid conformity, leading Veta to accept her brother and his extraordinary rabbit just as they are.