David Copperfield was a six-part television serial version of the Charles Dickens

Charles Dickens

Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

 novel first shown on BBC1

BBC One

BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...

 in 1974, a co-production with Time-Life Television Productions. It starred David Yelland

David Yelland (actor)

David William Yelland is an English actor of stage and screen.-Education:Yelland was educated at Magdalene College at the University of Cambridge, where he read English.-Life and career:...

 as David Copperfield, Martin Jarvis as Uriah Heep, and Arthur Lowe

Arthur Lowe

Arthur Lowe was a BAFTA Award winning English actor. He was best known for playing Captain George Mainwaring in the popular British sitcom Dad's Army from 1968 until 1977.-Early life:...

 as Wilkins Micawber. Also appearing were David Troughton

David Troughton

David Troughton is an English actor, best known for his Shakespearean roles on the British stage.- Biography :David Troughton was born in Hampstead, North London. He comes from a theatrical family: he is the son of Doctor Who actor Patrick Troughton, elder brother of Michael Troughton, and father...

, Ian Hogg

Ian Hogg (actor)

Ian Hogg is a British actor.- Early life :He is the son of a doctor and was educated at Durham School, Durham University and the Central School of Speech and Drama...

, Timothy Bateson

Timothy Bateson

Timothy Dingwall Bateson was a British actor. The son of Dingwall Bateson, a solicitor later knighted, he was educated at Uppingham School and Wadham College, Oxford....

, Patience Collier, Anthony Andrews

Anthony Andrews

-Life and career:Andrews was born in London, the son of Geraldine Agnes , a dancer, and Stanley Thomas Andrews, a musical arranger and musical conductor. He grew up in the North Finchley district of London...

 and Patricia Routledge

Patricia Routledge

Katherine Patricia Routledge, CBE is an English character comedy actress and singer. She is best known for her role as character Hyacinth Bucket in the British television series Keeping Up Appearances and Hetty Wainthropp in the British television series Hetty Wainthropp Investigates...

.

It was generally well received - for example in the review Clive James

Clive James

Clive James, AM is an Australian author, critic, broadcaster, poet and memoirist, best known for his autobiographical series Unreliable Memoirs, for his chat shows and documentaries on British television and for his prolific journalism...

 wrote for his Observer

The Observer

The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...

column: "David Copperfield is as good as everybody says. Steerforth's flaw is well conveyed by Anthony Andrews, and Uriah Heep, played by Martin Jarvis, is a miracle of unction: to hear him talk is like stepping on a toad long dead. But Arthur Lowe's Micawber is better than anything. He follows W C Fields in certain respects, but is graciously spoken; and his gestures are as delicate as Oliver Hardy

Oliver Hardy

Oliver Hardy was an American comic actor famous as one half of Laurel and Hardy, the classic double act that began in the era of silent films and lasted nearly 30 years, from 1927 to 1955.-Early life:...

's. Not that his performance is eclectic - it is a subtle unity like everything he attempts."