"Is it that Clara is more capable that Margaret thought or is that, as Margaret herself points out, her disability will be less apparent in Italy because, if anyone notices anything...off...about her, it will be put down to cultural differences and her facility with the language? Maybe it's both, although Clara seems relatively functional even at the beginning of the show."
I think it is both. If I recall correctly, the only two moments in the show when Clara's disability seems very apparent are when she panics after becoming lost in the streets of Florence, and then later during that dispute with Franca. Her other behavior, such as her reaction to the statues of naked men, could probably -- if we didn't know the truth -- be chalked up to her sense of humor and/or a sort of childlike, innocent nature that would not necessarily be considered abnormal.
At one point, when Margaret's husband objects to the Clara-Fabrizio relationship during one of his phone conversations with Margaret, he says something like, "If she has a child, she will drop it." I don't think we see anything in Clara's behavior to support that fear, so perhaps she has become more mentally capable than her father or mother had thought she would. |
