David Copperfield
David Copperfield (Daniel Radcliffe) lives a nearly-idyllic existence with his beautiful mother Clara (Emilia Fox) and their housekeeper Peggotty (Pauline Quirke). His life changes forever when his mother re-marries. Mr. Murdstone (Trevor Eve) is a no-nonsense businessman and a strict disciplinarian who believes in corporal punishment. David is soon sent to a strict boarding school, but when his mother dies, his stepfather sends him to London to work in a foul-smelling factory. He forms a close friendship with Mr. Micawber (Bob Hoskins) and moves in with the man and his loving family, but as the Micawbers are forced by circumstance to relocate, he seeks out his aunt Betsey Trotwood (Dame Maggie Smith). She sends him to fine school and he lodges with Mr. Wickfield (Oliver Ford Davies) and his daughter Agnes (Antonia Corrigan). As he grows, older David (Ciarán McMenamin) is apprenticed to a law firm where he meets the senior partner's daughter Dora (Joanna Page). Life's challenges continue to confront him but with help from friends and family, he overcomes adversity including his wife's death and his aunt's loss of savings. Eventually he has the satisfaction of seeing the conniving Uriah Heep (Nicholas Lyndhurst) sent to a penal colony.
- 1999-2000
- 1 season
- PBS
- Drama
David Copperfield (Daniel Radcliffe) lives a nearly-idyllic existence with his beautiful mother Clara (Emilia Fox) and their housekeeper Peggotty (Pauline Quirke). His life changes forever when his mother re-marries. Mr. Murdstone (Trevor Eve) is a no-nonsense businessman and a strict disciplinarian who believes in corporal punishment. David is soon sent to a strict boarding school, but when his mother dies, his stepfather sends him to London to work in a foul-smelling factory. He forms a close friendship with Mr. Micawber (Bob Hoskins) and moves in with the man and his loving family, but as the Micawbers are forced by circumstance to relocate, he seeks out his aunt Betsey Trotwood (Dame Maggie Smith). She sends him to fine school and he lodges with Mr. Wickfield (Oliver Ford Davies) and his daughter Agnes (Antonia Corrigan). As he grows, older David (Ciarán McMenamin) is apprenticed to a law firm where he meets the senior partner's daughter Dora (Joanna Page). Life's challenges continue to confront him but with help from friends and family, he overcomes adversity including his wife's death and his aunt's loss of savings. Eventually he has the satisfaction of seeing the conniving Uriah Heep (Nicholas Lyndhurst) sent to a penal colony.
Season 1 Episode Guide
2 Episodes 1999
Episode 1
Episode #1.1
Sat, Dec 25, 1999 90 mins
David's happy childhood days in the village of Blunderstone with his mother, Clara (Emilia Fox), and at Great Yarmouth with their servant, Peggotty (Pauline Quirke) and her family, are brought to an end by the marriage of Clara to high-minded but brutal Edward Murdstone (Trevor Eve). He and his sister, Jane (Zoë Wanamaker), move into the peaceful little house and begin a repressive regime. Peggotty is powerless to protect David and finds herself sidelined. Murdstone's loathing of the boy brings them to a confrontation that leads to David being sent away to school, where Mr Creakle (Ian McKellen) beats him as a matter of course but where he meets James Steerforth (Harry Lloyd), who becomes his friend and protector.
Episode 2
Episode #1.2
Sun, Dec 26, 1999 92 mins
Romance is in the air as David secretly gets engaged to his employer's daughter, the beautiful but dizzy Dora Spenlow, despite Mr. Spenlow's outrage. Spenlow's death soon after, however, gives David a chance to marry Dora, and he starts to write his stories and columns for newspapers. But what of the beautiful Agnes Wickfield (Amanda Ryan), his one constant friend? David is now working in London as a clerk at Spenlow's and living at Mrs. Crupp's (Dawn French) house. However, her fondness for "peppermint cordial" renders her incapable of fulfilling her promise to Aunt Betsey (Maggie Smith) to treat David as if he were her own son. A chance meeting with his old schoolfriend, James Steerforth (Oliver Milburn), leads to David being invited to dinner with Steerforth's mother (Cherie Lunghi). David also discovers from Agnes that her father's clerk, the lurking and evil Uriah Heep (Nicholas Lyndhurst), is to become a partner in her father's business, and the stage is set for a bitter battle
