o repeat from the introduction, a soliloquy is a long speech by a character that is either alone or believes they are alone to themselves. It provides the audience a view into the thoughts and desires of the character. Most popular films avoid this directly by adding a voice over narrator. This film goes a step further by breaking the fourth wall, or the invisible wall that is between the audience and the play, by having Vivian talk directly to the audience.
1. What does Vivian’s opening soliloquy tell us about her as a person and as a teacher? Is she a professor you would like to have yourself?
2. In her first monologue, Vivian says that, in the play to come, irony “is a literary device that will necessarily be deployed to great effect.” What is irony? What aspects of the play would you call ironic?
Metafiction is a literary device used to self-consciously and systematically draw attention to a work’s status as an artifact. One way to accomplish this is for a character to acknowledge they are a character. On multiple occasions Vivian pointedly acknowledges that she is within a play. She tells the audience her motivation, reasoning, and future events. She also has minor control over the order in which they proceed.
3. What is the effect of her directness? How does this make us feel for the character?
An example of foreshadowing is when Vivian says, “I’m waiting for the moment when someone asks me this question and I’ll be dead.” Foreshadowing is a hint of events to come, usually a small action that later is replicated on a grander scale. (To be clear, the diagnosis at the beginning of the film was also a clear example of foreshadowing for anyone in the medical profession.) Anton Checkov argued that everything in a play should be necessary, so therefore everything becomes foreshadowing. “One must never place a loaded rifle on the stage if it isn’t going to go off. It’s wrong to make promises you don’t mean to keep.” Most films do not follow this literally, but if something is brought into the camera’s focus (and its not product placement) then it will be significant to the plot later.
4. What is the question she is repeatedly asked, and who is the last one to ask her?
The Lesson in Empathy:
A repeating message within the play and film is the confusion, humiliation, and plain awkwardness of the modern medical system. The patient receives animosity for medical professional’s inconveniences for which she has no control. She is asked questions that seem absurd. She is treated as an object with little or no freedom over the course of her treatment. etc
5. Does this seem representative of the actual practice or is this exaggerated for effect? Explain.
6. Does this reveal a reality that many people believe exists and felt they have experienced? Explain
Main characters:
When discussing characters, one difference between film and television is that the characters in film tend to be more complex. The main reason for this is a film is usually a complete work where individual episodes are only a small portion of the larger work which is usually never completed. We, the audience, expect the main characters to develop in a film. In a television show, we usually want them to stay close to the same or at least change slowly.