Florence (Margote in the French version) is a kind-hearted young girl who is Dougal's young owner and one of the main characters of The Magic Roundabout. While Florence appears as the deuteragonist of the franchise, she is one of the supporting characters in the 2005 film.
Background[]
Concept and creation[]
Florence, known as Margote, is a fictional young girl created by Serge Danot and Ivor Wood. She was created to be Dougal's young owner and best friend in the series, as well as being the only character who is not an animal, but human. In both versions, Florence is portrayed as fun-loving, optimistic and caring as well as being level-headed, while in the English version, Florence's personality was slightly altered by Eric Thompson. She retains her fun-loving, optimistic, polite and caring nature, but her level-headedness in her character is centred around more often.
Personality[]
Florence is a very polite, kind-hearted, optimistic and caring young girl who loves Dougal and well as her friends in the gardens and would sometimes give Dougal a sugar cube. Despite her age, she is very sensible, mature and level-headed in any situation where she acts as a voice of reason when she tries to calm everyone down whenever arguments break out and persuade them to get along, as well as trying to keep everyone's spirits up, such as when she, along with Mr Rusty and the children are trapped in the frozen roundabout. Furthermore, she is also fun-loving as she likes to join in with games and spend time with her friends.
As much as she loves Dougal, there are times when she has to be stern with him whenever he is very rude, lazy, deceitful or particularly mean to his friends and this also applies for Zebedee when his tricks and mischief get found out. While she likes her friends, Florence would feel very upset and hurt if they happen to be not thinking about her birthday while walking past her or initially avoiding her when she comes to ask them to help her fix her fence while completely unaware that they were actually preparing a surprise thank you party for her and they didn't want to spill the beans of the surprise to her. On the latter note, this prompted Florence to try and leave to see some friends for a while and remains in that state for sometime that when her friends, including Dougal, attempt to make amends with her for avoiding her, she would turn them away, though she feels bad afterwards for being angry with her friends. She even feels that way in another episode after having to scold Dougal for rudely interrupting anyone's chances to get a word in about their holidays, and decides to look for Dougal so she can apologize to him.
Florence never likes rudeness in any way where it can come mainly from Dougal or sometimes from her friends depending on their antics and behaviour, but she doesn't become stern with those like Dougal's Auntie Primrose as she remains polite and friendly with them, regardless of what they can be like. Sometimes, Florence can be gullible when she trusts Buxton and showers him with affection, not knowing his true intentions until she ends up chained up in the dungeons. However, she isn't completely gullible as she can mostly see through Dougal's excuses because she knows Dougal can sometimes get into mischief or being selfish. Though she is displeased with Dougal or any of her friends' wrongdoings, Florence is also a forgiving person and an example of this shows that she forgives a remorseful Buxton for keeping her chained up in the factory dungeons. While retaining her sweet-nature and pleasantness, Florence is shown to have a bit of a sarcastic side, particularly in the Nigel Planer re-narrations of several episodes from the original series, but she isn't as sarcastic as Dougal.
She is very fond of her flower garden where one of her favourite hobbies would be planting flowers as well as watering them, and doesn't like anything bad happening to her garden where her displeasure is displayed when insects infest her garden where they would eat her flowers and when Dougal tramples through her garden by accident when using his nose to find a bone he buried. Other than gardening, Florence also likes to read books in her spare time and even keeps her house nice and tidy on a regular basis. Even though Dougal would come to her rescue to save her, particularly when she was trapped in the frozen roundabout, when she is stuck in Train's carriage when he goes out of control and when she is attacked by the enchanted household cleaning objects, Florence would actually come to anyone's rescue, may that be when Dougal got stuck down the hole or when Mr Grimsdale accidentally crashed into the roundabout. While Florence does get scared when she is threatened with danger or thunderstorms according to Dougal, she does show some forms of bravery.
Unlike her dog, Dougal, Florence is very respectful and takes interest into her friends' hobbies and interests by being sensitive to try and avoid upsetting their feelings - such as when she enjoys listening to Ermintrude's singing or having a look at Brian's collection of gravels as she knows how much Brian is very well attached to his interest of gravels. As well as being clever, Florence is also curious where she likes to learn new things and would often find out more from her friends. She is always very helpful to her friends whenever they need help, for instance, helping Dougal and Brian to load the piano onto Train's wagon.
Physical appearance[]
Florence is a young and slender English girl with fair skin, a light dusting of freckles, rosy cheeks, thin pink lips, brown shoulder-length hair with short bangs, brown eyebrows and blue eyes.
For attire, Florence wears a cornflower blue sweater with a white collar, an yellow-orange knee length skirt with a white laced petticoat underneath, white socks and a pair of beige leather lace-up ankle boots in the style of a "Babybotte" model with tan soles that extend as the heel blocks at the back of her boots. On top of her head, she wears a cornflower blue hair bow.
In the original series prior to the 2005 redesign of Florence's character design, her eyes were originally black dot eyes, the collar of her sweater was orange and her boots were white. She originally wore a pair of white gloves.
In two episodes of the revival series ("Chilled-Out Brian" and "Radio Roundabout"), she is seen without her hair bow when she is asleep in bed. Since the second season of the CGI revival series, she started to wear a pink checkered bandana over her bow and hair whilst doing cleaning around her house. In one episode (Dougal's See-Saw Ride), she has a silver analogue watch on her right wrist that has a pink strap, a white clock face that has the numbers in roman numerals, a pink flower with its green leaves as the minute and the hour hands.
Relationship[]
Dougal[]
- Main article: Dougal and Florence's relationship
Florence loves her dog, Dougal where they have a loving friendship. Although, she worries about Dougal sometimes, particularly with his health, or his disappearance. Even when she doesn't like Dougal's rudeness where she gets a bit annoyed with him, she still loves him, no matter what. Whenever Dougal is outwitted or overwhelmed by any of his friends, Florence is always there to comfort him. But unlike Dougal who is usually rude and gruff, Florence is very mindful and kind to her friends which she adores.
Brian[]
She takes interest with Brian's hobbies such as his gravel collection because she knows how much it means to him and thanking him for his thoughtfulness when he comes to help Florence and her friends, such as when he brings some spare string for the tent that Dylan had unintentionally collapsed while taking the string for his guitar.
Ermintrude[]
Florence is also friends with Ermintrude where they are both generally pleasant. She takes interest in Ermintrude's opera singing as she is being considerate while listening to the sound of her voice.
Dylan[]
She and Dylan are also friends where Florence comes to help him whenever he is having problems, such as when he was having trouble with his sleepwalking situation.
Zebedee[]
Florence always meets Zebedee at the roundabout before she goes to the garden. When she sees that her friends are having a problem, Florence would call for Zebedee for assistance. She would find Zebedee's tricks and mischief annoying as it can cause fright and trouble for her friends to the point where she admonishes him for causing mischief with anyone, but she is still friends with him. While Florence remains stern with Zebedee for his mischievous antics, she isn't keen with Mr Rusty's idea of Zebedee's magic being revoked to teach him a lesson, but reluctantly goes with it until she tells him to stop after seeing Zebedee completely downhearted.
Mr Rusty[]
Mr Rusty is one of Florence's human friends, and he is considered a dear friend. Given that Mr Rusty is a father figure to Florence, she would come to Mr Rusty for advice or for his assistance to help any of her friends. He and Florence would usually meet up at the roundabout before she visits the garden.
Florence's friends[]
Paul, Basil and Coral are a group of children Florence spends time with when they are riding the roundabout or exploring the garden. During the time when Florence, Basil and Coral are trapped on the roundabout after it froze over, she reassures them that Dougal and his friends will save them. As she is a dear friend to Basil and Coral, Florence orders two toys to give to them for their birthday and has a see-saw built at her house as a surprise so that they can play there anytime they wish.
Mr McHenry[]
Mr McHenry is another one of Florence's human friends. In the revival series, he is more than happy to help Florence with tips of making a painting where she advances her painting skills to make a painting of Dougal. In the second season of the revival series, Florence invited Mr McHenry at her house for tea.
Mr Grimsdale[]
Mr Grimsdale helps delivers the things Florence orders to her house and even provides assistance for her. Florence cares about him and his workload where she advises him to go on a well-deserved holiday after he had an accident due to his tiredness and kindly offers to deliver some of the things to help reduce Mr Grimsdale's workload when he is behind on his deliveries.
Buxton[]
Florence takes a liking to Buxton and is interested in him while unaware of his true treacherous colours until she was captured and imprisoned with all her friends. Before she was captured and after being rescued by Dougal, Florence does care for Buxton and when she sees him crying in remorse, she is one of the people who forgives him.
Zeebad[]
Though Zeebad and Florence hardly met each other, she listens to Zebedee's story about Zeebad after she was trapped on the roundabout with Mr Rusty and the children and understands about Zeebad's dark nature where she doesn't hold a slightest grudge to those who were tricked to be Zeebad's henchmen.
Soldier Sam[]
Sam is one of those Florence would turn to for help or as an ally who would ask her for assistance. When Sam was Zeebad's henchman and seeing his corpse, Florence doesn't hold a grudge against him unlike Dougal, understanding very well that Sam was made victim to Zeebad's dark sorcery. In "Barmy Army", Florence volunteers herself and her friends as Sam's stand-in soldier friends to try and cheer him up when he is informed that his soldier friends are delayed.
Digger[]
Digger is Dougal's Australian cousin who Florence takes a liking to and enjoys listening to his jokes, something that makes Dougal jealous. Nevertheless, she reassures Dougal that while he and Digger are funny in their own ways, but they are always different to each other.
Auntie Primrose[]
Primrose is Dougal's dreaded aunt who Florence welcomes in as a guest, regardless of her brash personality. While she has to agree with Dougal who tried to warn her about Primrose, Florence is more worried for Primrose's safety where at this point she rushes to save Primrose when the Magic Roundabout is spinning out of control (courtesy of Zebedee) and convinces Dougal to rescue Primrose.
Hobbies and interests[]
- Gardening: Florence loves planting and watering her flowers in her own garden around her path and would tend to her garden most often. Other times, she would be gardening in her own vegetable patch.
- Reading: She likes reading in her spare time may that be interesting stories from books or newspaper articles.
- Knitting: She is also shown to doing some knitting in her spare time as well where in "The Snail With The Golden Shell" she was knitting a new scarf for Brian which she gives to him at the end of the episode.
- Walking: Florence would take peaceful strolls around the garden to see her friends, particularly when the weather is nice.
- Cleaning: Florence likes to keep everything neat and tidy. She would spend her time wisely to do the housework by dusting and hovering.
Abilities and talents[]
- Singing: Florence is shown to be good at singing where she sings her morning song as she cleans her bedroom in "Dougal and the Blue Cat" and her sad song when she and all of her friends minus Dougal are imprisoned in the factory dungeons. Other times, she would be shown humming while doing the housework.
- Teaching: Having a very good education for a young girl, Florence once became a schoolteacher in "School's In, Out and Roundabout" where she teaches basic school lessons to her friends, such as Maths and Geography. In "Magic Fairy Ring" and "The Magic Roundabout Choir", she respectively teaches her friends how to dance like fairies and sing really well as a choir. Florence is patient when they have a few difficulties of keeping up and encourages them to keep trying.
- Cooking: Florence is known for cooking with her best culinary skills. In the original series, she has made a pie all by herself and has it baked in Dougal's oven. She would be making and baking pies more often in the CGI revival series for Dougal's dinner. Other times, she would make and bake cakes big or small where she made a gigantic circus cake for after the show in "The Greatest Show On Earth" and a big fairy cake in "Dylan's Big Gig" to be used as a exchange for the fairies to use their glow to light up Dylan's stage for his gig.
- Art: She is also splendid with her artistic and creativity skills where in the original series episode The Exhibition she has painted one of the portraits for the exhibition. In the revival series episode "Can't Sing, Won't Sing", she uses her creativity skills to modify Ermintrude's lucky tiara for her evening concert and in "The Genius", with advice from Mr McHenry, she plans to paint a portrait of some buttercups until Ermintrude foolishly eats the buttercups that Florence was using as she was painting her portrait. However, with more assistance from Mr McHenry Florence manages to paint a portrait of Dougal which she presents to her dog.
- Sewing: In addition to knitting, Florence is very good at sewing where she repairs Mr McHenry's bagpipes in Dylan's Bagpipes with a single hair from Dougal's fur.
- Music: She is shown to be playing a flute quite well in The Orchestra for Zebedee's concert. It is presumed that Florence also plays her piano, but isn't shown to be playing it on-screen at any point, though in "Follow That Piano", Florence kindly lets Ermintrude borrow her piano to practice her singing. In the 2008 video game, Florence plays a guitar in Dylan's orchestra and has to follow Dougal's directions when he is a conductor.
Trivia[]
- Florence's English name, coming from the Latin word "florentius", means "blossoming", "flourishing", and "prosperous".
- In at least a few early episodes of the French dubs of the black-and-white series such as "The Land of Flowers" and "A New Friend", Florence occasionally refers to certain characters with the "monsieur" (Mr) or "madame" (Miss) prefix. This trait would later be carried over to Brian.
- Like Zebedee, Florence was one of the characters in the American dub of the 2005 film who retains her original personality and voice actress. Though Kylie Minogue re-voiced her dialogue with an American accent.
- The signature laced ankle boots Florence wears were a very recognizable Babybotte model with its famous "heel blocks" at the time when the original series was in production. They were kept in the same similar fashion for the CGI redesign of Florence in the 2005 film and the 2007 revival series. In 2014, Florence has been featured within Babybotte's promotional material to celebrate the show's 50th Anniversary. [1]. In 2020, the Babybotte brand went into liquidation [2] and returned in 2021 by the Italian manufacturer Fr by Romagnoli. [3]
- Even though the "heel blocks" at the backs of Florence's boots were made white from Series 2 onwards in the original series, they were sometimes coloured brown to match with the soles in merchandising and small book adaptations.
- In printed media of the original series, it is shown that Florence wears a pair of tights with her shoes. In the Playhour comics, she wears tan tights.
- Despite her parents weren't seen at any point, Florence does sometimes mention them in some episodes of the French version of the original series.
- Except for the series premiere, Florence practically appears in the most, if not every episode of the original series.
- She makes a cameo in the trailer of Action Synthese's cancelled animated film "Stupid Invaders" as a doll on a bed.
- When the small scaled figure of Florence came out in the KFC's toy line for the 2005 film, she has five fingers on each hand instead of four.
- Florence is shown to suffer from hay fever, which means being allergic to pollen in the air, as this was evident in the CGI revival series episode "Let's Stick Together".
- Florence seems to be the only character to wear only one outfit, in which for two episodes in the revival series ("Chilled-Out Brian" and "Radio Roundabout"), she is shown to be sleeping in her normal attire, with exception of her hair bow as she doesn't sleep with it on.
- Her original French voice actress, Patricia Danot, daughter of the show's creator Serge Danot, reprised her role when redubbing the dialogue for the AB Productions remasters of the original series episodes.
- In the French version of the original series, it was believed that Florence is from Paris, but in the original French version of "Dougal and the Blue Cat", it is revealed that she was from China.