Woodward) who was once her student. Now the power is the intern's, and he has the choice to use his power compassionately; or in the same way as Vivian used hers when she refused to forgive the young student's need to be late with an assignment. It brings the viewer to the thought: Does the professor (healer/physician) want to be known as the brilliant one, the one with the unquestionable and utmost knowledge; or does he (she) want to be known as the brilliant healer (professor) because he (she) uses their own brilliance to bring about brilliant results in their students (patients)? This is something we are supposed to ponder, because Posner has a conversation with nurse Susie Monahan (Audra McDonald), and tells Susie about Vivian's brilliance, her academic scholarship, admitting to Vivian's brilliance, even though, in his own case, she chose to be perceived as the brilliant academic over the imparter of brilliance. Here is where it is interesting, because Posner makes the same election. He...

He chooses, instead, to be austere, cold, clinical physician who is biding his internship in wait of pursuing his true passion: research. In fact, he describes to Vivian the intelligent, the brilliant cancer cells that he finds amazing, forgetting that those brilliant and intelligent little cells are destroying, killing, the life before him. He chooses to be perceived as brilliant, over humane -- like Vivian. They are two of a kind.
It is only the nurse, Susie, who rises above her own brilliance to be brilliant in the care, compassion, and imparting of the expertise and knowledge she has. She builds the bond of humanity between herself and Vivian, and is one of the few sources of solace in Vivian's life as the words that once sustained her, words by which she lived her life, now fail her.

Reference List

Nichols, Mike (Director), 2001. Wit, HBO Films, Avenue Pictures Productions, USA.