[next scene: Longbourn. Mr. Bingley and Mr. Darcy arrive at the door. Mrs. Bennet answers]
Mrs. Bennet: Oh, Mr. Bingley! You have returned from London at last. Oh – and you've brought your friend along again.
Mr. Bingley: It's such a lovely day out. I wondered if we could all go out for a walk.
Mrs. Bennet: Me, walk? No, no. It is too disagreeable for my nerves. But, er, of course Jane would love to go along with you. Lizzy, Kitty, Mary, do go along [to the girls only] and keep him away from Jane and Bingley!
Mary: I have far too much studying to do.
[next scene: in a country road. Jane and Bingley walk far ahead, arm in arm. Behind them are Kitty, Lizzy and Mr. Darcy, all awkwardly silent]
Kitty: Lucas Lodge is just down the path from here. I'm going to go visit Maria. Don't wait for me, I'll meet you back home. [leaves]
Lizzy: I hope I do not shock you by saying I was hoping to be left alone with you. I am a selfish creature, and I must satisfy my own emotions, even if it brings embarrassment to you. I can no longer conceal the gratitude I feel to you for what you have done for our family.
Darcy: I did not think Mrs. Gardiner so little to be trusted.
Lizzy: Do not blame my aunt. Lydia's thoughtlessness first betrayed the secret to me, and then I would not rest until I knew the whole truth. But again, I think you for the trouble you went through, I can only imagine the mortification you suffered. I thank you for all my family, since they do not know.
Darcy: You are too generous to trifle with me. If you feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject for ever.
Lizzy: I, that is, I will have you to understand – my sentiments have undergone so material a change, since the period to which you allude, that it makes me receive with gratitude and pleasure, your present assurances.
Darcy: Elizabeth, you are the most important person in my heart – besides perhaps my sister.
Lizzy: But what brought you back here, now?
Darcy: You are indebted for our present good understanding to the efforts of my aunt, who called on me in her return through London, and there related her journey to Longbourn, its motive, and the substance of her conversation with you; dwelling emphatically on every one of your expressions, which, in my Aunt's apprehension, peculiarly denoted your perverseness and assurance, in the belief that such a relation must assis her endeavours to obtain that promise from me, which you had refused to give. But, unluckily for my Aunt, its effect was exactly contrariwise. I knew enough of your disposition to be certain, that, had you been absolutely, irrevocably decided against me, you would have acknowledged it to Lady Catherine, frankly and openly.
Lizzy: Yes, you know enough about my frankness to believe me capable of that. After abusing you so much to your face, I could have no scruples doing so to your relations.
Darcy: What did you say of me, that I did not deserve? For, though your accusations were ill-founded, formed on mistaken premises, my behaviour to you at the time, had merited the severest reproof. It was unpardonable. I cannot think of it without abhorrence.
Lizzy: Let's not talk about that. Neither of our conduct was irreproachable. But since then we have both, I hope, improved in civility.
Darcy: I cannot be so easily reconciled to myself. The recollection of what I then said, of my conduct, my manners, my expressions during the whole of it, is now, and has been many months, inexpressibly painful to me. Your reproof, so well applied, I shall never forget: "had you behaved in a more gentleman-like manner." Those were your words. You know not, you can scarcely conceive, how they have tortured me; - though it was some time, I confess, before I was reasonable enough to allow their justice.'
Lizzy: I never expected they would make so strong an impression.
Darcy: I can easily believe it. You thought me then devoid of every proper feeling, I am sure you did. The turn of your countenance I shall never forget, as you said that I could not have addressed you in any possible way that would induce you to accept me.
Lizzy: Oh, don't remind me what I said back then. These recollections will not do at all. I am ashamed to think of it.
Darcy: Was it my letter? Did you, on reading it, give any credit to its contents?
Lizzy: My former prejudices were removed – but only gradually.
Darcy: I hope you have destroyed the letter. There was one part especially, the opening of it, which I should dread your having the power of reading again. I can remember some expressions which might justly make you hate me.
Lizzy: I will burn it, if you think it will preserve my regard for you. But, though we both know my opinions are not unalterable, I hope you do not think they can be changed as easily as that.
Darcy: I believed myself perfectly calm and cool, but I am since convinced that it was written in a dreadful bitterness of spirit.
Lizzy: Maybe it began in bitterness, but its end has been pure charity. Think no more of the letter. The opinion of the man who wrote it and the woman who received it have changed so much. You must take my philosophy. Remember only so much of the past as gives you pleasure.
Darcy: I cannot give you credit for any philosophy of the kind. Your retrospections must be so totally void of reproach, that the contentment arising from them is not of philosophy, but, what is much better, of innocence. But with me, it is not so. Painful recollections will intrude which cannot, which ought not, to be repelled. I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. As a child I was taught what was right, but I was not taught to correct my temper. I was given good principles, but left to follow them in pride and conceit. Unfortunately an only son (for many years an only child), I was spoilt by my parents, who, though good themselves (my father, particularly, all that was benevolent and amiable), allowed, encouraged, almost taught me to be selfish and overbearing; to care for none beyond my own family circle; to think meanly of all the rest of the world; to wish at least to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was, from eight to eight and twenty; and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled. I came to you without a doubt of my reception. You shewed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased.
[Lizzy and Darcy stop and look into each other's eyes, and both smile.]
Darcy: [singing] I wasn't jealous before we met
Lizzy: Now every woman I see is a potential threat
Darcy: And I'm possessive, it isn't nice
Lizzy: You've heard me saying that smoking was my only vice
Darcy: But now it isn't true
Lizzy: Now everything is new
Darcy: And all I've learned has overturned
Lizzy: I beg of you
Darcy: Don't go wasting your emotion
Lizzy: Lay all your love on me
Darcy: It was like shooting a sitting duck
A little small talk, a smile and baby I was stuck
Lizzy: I still don't know what you've done with me
A grown-up woman should never fall so easily
Darcy: I feel a kind of fear
When I don't have you near
Unsatisfied, I skip my pride
Lizzy: I beg you dear
Lizzy + Darcy:
Don't go wasting your emotion
Lay all your love on me
Don't go sharing your devotion
Lay all your love on me
[Lizzy takes Darcy's hand, and running, leads him down the side of a hill. In the grassy valley below, Darcy wraps his arms around her, and twirls her around in the air]
Darcy: I've had a few little love affairs
They didn't last very long and they've been pretty scarce
I used to think that was sensible
Lizzy: It makes the truth even more incomprehensible
'Cause everything is new
And everything is you
Darcy:
And all I've learned has overturned
What can I do
Lizzy + Darcy:
Don't go wasting your emotion
Lay all your love on me
Don't go sharing your devotion
Lay all your love on me
[Lizzy and Darcy kiss]
[next scene: Lizzy and Darcy, now on the way back, are holding hands]
Lizzy: How did you ever fall in love with me? I can understand you going along charmingly, once it started, but how did you ever let it begin?
Darcy: I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.
Lizzy: My beauty you had early withstood, and as for my manners, they were uncivil at best. I never spoke but to hurt you. Be sincere, did you admire me for my impertinence?
Darcy: For the liveliness of your mind, I did.
Lizzy: Well, you may as well call it impertinence. It was little else. The fact is, you were sick of civility, of deference, of officious attention. You were disgusted with the women who were always speaking, and looking, and thinking for your approbation alone. I roused and interested you, because I was so unlike them. Had you not been really amiable, you would have hated me for it. But despite the pains you took to disguise it, your feelings were always noble and just. In your heart, you thoroughly despised the people who so assiduously courted you. There – I have saved you the trouble of accounting for it. And all things considered, I think it perfectly reasonable. To be sure, you knew no actual good of me – but nobody thinks of those things when they fall in love.
[Darcy kisses her]
Lizzy: Now we must go home. We shall have quite the shocking announcement. The surprise to my mother's nerves may just been intolerable. But I think she shall be quite pleased. Oh yes, I shall be the star of my family tonight. [the music swells and she sings a reprise of "Super Trouper"] Facing twenty thousand of your friends There are moments when I think I'm going crazy Tonight the Tonight the So I'll be there when you arrive
How can anyone be so lonely?
Part of a success that never ends
Still I'm thinkin' about you only
(Still I'm thinkin' about you only)
(Think I'm going crazy)
And it's gonna be alright
(You'll soon be changing everything)
Everything will be so different
When I'm on the stage tonight
Super Trouper lights are gonna find me
Shinin' like the sun
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Smilin', havin' fun
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Feeling like a number one
Super Trouper beams are gonna blind me
But I won't feel blue
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Like I always do
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
'Cause somewhere in the crowd there's you
The sight of you will prove to me, I'm still alive
And when you take me in your arms and hold me tight
I know it's gonna mean so much tonight
[scene switches to a church, Lizzy and Darcy, and behind them Jane and Bingley, exit, just having gotten married. The excited wedding guests follow them outside, singing]
Crowd: Tonight the Super Trouper lights are gonna find me Super Trouper beams are gonna blind me
Tonight the
Super Trouper lights are gonna find me
Shinin' like the sun
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Smilin', havin' fun
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Feeling like a number one
Super Trouper beams are gonna blind me
But I won't feel blue
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Like I always do
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
'Cause somewhere in the crowd there's you
Shinin' like the sun
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Smilin', havin' fun
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Feeling like a number one
But I won't feel blue
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)
Like I always do
(Su-p-per Trou-p-per)