#we have Morfydd Clark playing both Dora and Clara!

[myfanfictiongarden]

Alright, so yesterday I watched with my mum The Personal History of David Copperfield (2019) and the movie was great, there are many things I absolutely love about this version and my mum who never read the original novel enjoyed it too.

But there is one part, one scene actually that absolutely should have been placed a bit earlier and the dialogue be a tiny bit changed. Seriously, I was so upset that I kept rumbling about it for half an hour to her afterwards!!!

Spoiler opinion for The Personal History of David Copperfield as well as the novel David Copperfield.

So, in the movie, after David and the whole gang confront Uriah Heep there is this moment of Dora suddenly being among them as well and asking the audience why she is here- cut to David writing and her talking to him, asking after a while to be written out as she doesn’t belong there. Now if you’ve read the novel you know that Dora would try to be helpful to him and would ask to hold his pens, so I loved the movie addressing that. If you’ve read the novel you also know Dora wasn’t there at the Uriah confrontation because she died before that.

Look, I’m not saying the movie should have shown all their happy married life and her tragic death, but there was definitely a better way to address her death without showing it.

Here is what they should have done:

The movie goes on like filmed all up to the moment when David wants to propose to Dora. He tries to propose to her and then we suddenly cut to him writing. He is looking at the page he has been writing at when Dora appears, she asks him to hold his pens wishing to be useful. He turns back to writing but continues to just stare at the same page again. Dora seems to be thinking about things and, while still with a smile, she says a bit sadly to him “You know, we did have it wonderfully, didn’t we? But, Dody, please write me out. You have to let me go.” She places the pens back on the table and quietly leaves. David is silently watching the place she just stood before finally continuing to write. AFTER THAT we see aunt Betsy and Mr Dick arriving and telling that they’re all ruined and poor. After finding a new accommodation for the three of them David remembers he promised James they’ll go to the coast. The visit to Yarmouth happens like in the movie and everything else too.

Now why the change of scene with Dora? Because in the movie she is just randomly forgotten for a time and then suddenly appears in a comic way. But if that pen scene would have been earlier then people who didn’t read the book would say “Oh, she said no to the proposal and he was sad but had to move on because his life went just downhill after that and he mistakenly puts her into the story later again because he still missed her” BUT people who had read the book would say “Oh, it’s that pen-scene from the novel, and oh he can’t write on because their marriage was so short and she died, and her saying here Let me go is him copping with the fact that she is no more 😭 yet he has to write on because life doesn’t stop, look it’s aunt Betsy and Mr Dick and they all lost their money, but James pulls David for a moment out of misery taking him to the coast and David meets the people of his happiest memories again, life is colorful again until Emily runs away with James! Oh, London life is bleak but David still takes in the Macawer family - and look all of them made him a small study to write in, he needs to write everything down! Agnes appears and they confront Uriah! For a moment there is Dora (because David would still love for her to be part of the story, but she says “Cut me out, I don’t belong here”.) The storm is coming, Emily is found, James drowns, David confesses to Agnes that he loves her. Happy End after much sadness”