Harvey recap

Elwood P. Dowd is a gentle man who spends his days with Harvey, a giant rabbit visible to him but almost no one else. His sister Veta, fearing that his behavior has destroyed her daughter Myrtle Mae's social prospects, tries to commit him to Chumley's Rest. A diagnostic blunder leads the staff to detain Veta and release Elwood. As the doctors scramble to correct the mistake, Elwood remains gracious, while evidence accumulates that Harvey may be a real pooka rather than a delusion. Dr. Chumley encounters Harvey and is forced to reconsider his certainty. Elwood finally agrees to an injection that would make him stop seeing Harvey, but a taxi driver's warning that the treatment makes agreeable people hard and calculating changes Veta's mind. She prevents the injection and takes her brother home as he is. Harvey briefly considers staying with Chumley, then follows Elwood.

Veta Louise Simmons and her daughter, Myrtle Mae, are holding a social gathering at the family home when Veta's brother Elwood P. Dowd arrives and begins introducing guests to Harvey, his unseen companion. Elwood describes Harvey as an enormous white rabbit, and the embarrassed visitors quickly leave. Convinced that her brother's behavior has made a normal social life impossible, Veta takes him to Chumley's Rest to have him committed. During the intake interview, however, Veta becomes so distressed that she admits she sometimes sees Harvey herself. Dr. Sanderson concludes that Veta is the patient and that Elwood is the sane relative. Veta is detained, Elwood is released, and he calmly invites Sanderson and Nurse Kelly out for drinks. When Dr. Chumley learns more of the case, he recognizes the mistake, frees an outraged Veta, dismisses Sanderson, and begins searching for Elwood.

The sanitarium's staff and the Dowd family try to locate Elwood before the error becomes a public scandal. Elwood returns home as if nothing unusual has happened and speaks amiably about Harvey. Veta and Judge Gaffney press Chumley for a remedy, while Myrtle Mae develops an interest in the attendant Wilson despite his part in her mother's ordeal. Chumley pursues Elwood to his usual bar, but the encounter does not go as the psychiatrist expects. Chumley later returns shaken and missing some of his possessions, and the doors and signals around him seem to respond to an unseen presence. Elwood explains that Harvey is a pooka, a supernatural being able to stop time and move people from place to place. Chumley, no longer secure in his disbelief, privately confides in Elwood about his fantasy of escaping responsibility and spending quiet weeks in Akron with a beautiful stranger. Elwood listens without judging him.

Everyone gathers at Chumley's Rest, where the doctors propose giving Elwood a formula that will end his visions of Harvey. Elwood agrees simply because Veta wants it, showing none of the resentment the others might expect after their efforts to confine him. Harvey appears willing to remain with Chumley, whose secret longing he understands. Just before the injection, taxi driver E. J. Lofgren asks for his unpaid fare and remarks that people brought to the sanitarium are often kind on the way in but become hard and impatient after treatment. Veta sees Elwood quietly settle the fare she neglected and realizes that becoming conventional would cost him his generosity. She stops the injection and decides to take him home unchanged. Elwood leaves with Veta and Myrtle Mae. Although Harvey has momentarily stayed behind with Chumley, he chooses his old friend and follows Elwood, while Chumley remains newly aware that Elwood's impossible companion is real.

Elwood agrees without resentment to receive Chumley's formula, which is supposed to stop him from seeing Harvey and make him conventionally practical. Before the injection, taxi driver E. J. Lofgren tells Veta that patients he drives to Chumley's Rest are pleasant on arrival but cold, impatient, and calculating afterward. When Veta realizes the change would destroy the kindness she values in Elwood, she halts the treatment. Elwood pays the cab fare that Veta had forgotten and prepares to return home with her and Myrtle Mae. Harvey, who has briefly accepted Chumley's invitation to remain with the doctor, ultimately chooses Elwood and follows him out. Chumley is left with a glimpse of the escape from ordinary life he had privately wished for, while the Dowd family leaves with Elwood unchanged and Veta newly willing to accept the unseen companion who comes with him.