History Headscratchers / MrsDoubtfire

*** This was years before camera phones existed, so nothing could be shown. I doubt the restaurant wanted to bring that kind of publicity to itself and wouldn't publicize it. Nor would many people dining would feel that it was something especially newsworthy except an exceptionally strange family argument. On the surface, there was nothing illegal about anything that happened there, unless Miranda wanted to press charges against Daniel for violating their custody arrangement, which she was too shocked to do at the time. And how often do you hear about custody disputes on the news, unless they involve celebrities or kidnapping/murder?

*** IIRC, Daniel never actually confessed to spiking Stu's food. He says "Oh God I killed the bastard", but he only mutters it to himself. As far as anyone knows, something accidentally went wrong in the kitchen and Daniel had nothing to do with it.
* Miranda says they have nothing in common, and I agree with her. Daniel is a clownish immature guy, and Miranda is a serious mature woman. Here's the headscratcher...if they have nothing in common, why the heck did she marry him, and have his kids? She would have broken it off with him on the first date. I'm surprised their relationship lasted that long.

** By that moment Daniel has already shown himself as Mrs. Doubtfire and explained that he intended to make her the host of the new show (after accidentally showing up at his table in disguise, but managed to convince Lundy that was his plan all along). So Lundy just saw that Daniel saved a man from choking and ended in a fight with the woman. If Daniel said something like "She is my ex-wife", Lundy probably wouldn't press for more information and continue their dinner.
** As for “what happened next”, a deleted scene shows Daniel, still in his Doubtfire garb, arriving back at Steiner Street in a taxi to speak with Miranda

** Mrs Doubtfire explicitly tells Miranda she is from England, so if Miranda told Stu this then he probably took it as read. An out-of-universe explanation is that England is sometimes conflated with Great Britain, particularly in American media (in fact, this occurs near the end of the movie in the show-within-a-film, where England is inaccurately described as an island). No-one raising the inconsistency of Doubtfire’s English origin with her Scottish accent might therefore be due to a mistake on the part of the writers.

** When did Stu call him an idiot? The word I remember is "loser". Which is closer to the mark, given how irresponsible Daniel is and that he's chronically unemployed.

** I'd say it's considerably more strange that Miranda didn't instantly suspect Mrs. Doubtfire of being a disguised Daniel when he brought up Stuart Little when speaking to Natalie. I mean, it is literally Natalie's favourite book, not just any old book she likes, and Daniel knows this, so for her to bring it up out of the blue should have set off an alarm in Miranda's head. And then, of course, Chris saying she's "big for a lady", Mrs. Doubtfire suggesting Daniel babysit the children, and the fact that she knows where everything is in the kitchen, should have confirmed that initial suspicion to her. But there was never any suspicion to begin with, which perhaps indicates that Miranda is simply very gullible and desperate.

** Mrs Doubtfire explicitly tells Miranda she is from England, so if Miranda told Stu this then he probably took it as read. An out-of-universe explanation is that England is sometimes conflated with Great Britain, particularly in American media (in fact, this occurs near the end of the movie in the show-within-a-film, where England is inaccurately described as an island). No-one raising the inconsistency of Doubtfire’s English origin with her Scottish accent might therefore be due to CriticalResearchFailure on the part of the writers.

** You're forgetting that Daniel is displaying an unbelievable level of self-control. This is the guy who keeps randomly quitting jobs and putting on stupid stunts like secret parties that Miranda isn't supposed to know about when it's ''pretty dang obvious'' that's she's going to find out. (Even if she hadn't come home earlier, could Daniel really have taken down all the decorations in time?) The idea that Daniel could pull off a sustained, long-term scheme like this is unthinkable to her. And that, in fact, is the point. Daniel is so passionate about staying in contact with his kids that he manages to actually focus and get something done for once, first by setting up the scheme and later by sustaining it (by learning to cook, for instance). Miranda doesn't think Daniel is capable of all that. Don't forget that the scheme itself is ''really'' out of left field; when was the last time ''you'' suspected that an elderly British woman was actually a middle-aged man in disguise?? The reality is so bizarre, on multiple levels, that it's no wonder that Miranda doesn't catch on.

** You're forgetting that Daniel is displaying an unbelievable level of self-control. This is the guy who keep randomly quitting jobs and putting on stupid stunts like secret parties that Miranda isn't supposed to know about when it's ''pretty dang obvious'' that's she's going to find out. (Even if she hadn't come home earlier, could Daniel really have taken down all the decorations in time?) The idea that Daniel could pull off a sustained, long-term scheme like this is unthinkable to her. And that, in fact, is the point. Daniel is so passionate about staying in contact with his kids that he manages to actually focus and get something done for once, first by setting up the scheme and later by sustaining it (by learning to cook, for instance). Miranda doesn't think Daniel is capable of all that. Don't forget that the scheme itself is ''really'' out of left field; when was the last time ''you'' suspected that an elderly British woman was actually a middle-aged man in disguise?? The reality is so bizarre, on multiple levels, that it's no wonder that Miranda doesn't catch on.

** He most likely took the remote out of the aquarium after the end of the scene, dried it, tested to see if it worked (it likely still did) and then hid it. But he did that to distance his Mrs. Doubtfire character from himself; doing that made her look very strict to his children, and they'd be less likely to realise that she's their father in diguise. I mean, they also could have told their mother that she made them do housework. But they were so impressed by "her" exceptional cooking and were so pleased to see that their mother was truly happy for the first time in years that they probably thought "OK, our nanny is very strict, but Mum is happy, so let's keep her strictness a secret." And, as time went on, Daniel significantly toned down the character's strictness so they had no further reason to bring it up.

*** Also, Daniel didn't know Miranda would arrive home from work early. He arranged everything in secret was optimistic enough to think that he could have the party and get rid of the animals, children, decorations and all other evidence of it before she came home, and she'd never know. Daniel took an immense risk - even if Miranda had arrived home a few hours later, him being able to clean up such a wild party in time was a ''very'' long shot.

** Furthermore, Miranda became a lot more responsible as their relationship progressed while Daniel remained a ManChild. She fully embraced parenthood and became 100% committed to working hard to provide for her family. Daniel, on the other hand, is shown to have never truly committed to acting his age, instead treating married life and fatherhood as a big kids game and never learning from his mistakes. The party he threw signalled to Miranda that he was ''never'' going to learn, and that his immaturity was now ruining her life. She had given him enough second chances to grow up and take their relationship seriously, and, devoid of hope, decided that divorce was the only option.

* After Miranda informed Mrs. Sellner that Daniel didn't have a sister, what was Daniel planning to do the next time Mrs. Sellner came to check his apartment? How was he going to explain about the woman who claimed to be his sister once Miranda told her that Daniel didn't have any?

** Furthermore, Miranda became a lot more responsible as their relationship progressed while Daniel remained a ManChild. She fully embraced parenthood and became 100% committed to working hard to provide for her family. Daniel, on the other hand, is shown to have never truly committed to acting his age, instead treating married life and fatherhood as a big kids game and never learning from his mistakes. The party he threw signalled to Daniel he was ''never'' going to learn, and that his immaturity was now ruining her life. She had given him enough second chances to grow up and take their relationship seriously, and, devoid of hope, decided that divorce was the only option.

** Furthermore, Miranda became a lot more responsible as their relationship progressed while Daniel remained a ManChild. She fully embraced parenthood and became 100% committed to working hard to provide for her family. Daniel, on the other hand, is shown to have never truly committed to acting his age, instead treating married life and fatherhood as a big kids game and never learning from his mistakes. The party he threw signalled to Daniel he was ''never'' going to learn, and that his immaturity was now ruining her life.

** Furthermore, Miranda became a lot more responsible as their relationship progressed while Daniel remained a [[ManChild]]. She fully embraced parenthood and became 100% committed to working hard to provide for her family. Daniel, on the other hand, is shown to have never truly committed to acting his age, instead treating married life and fatherhood as a big kids game and never learning from his mistakes. The party he threw signalled to Daniel he was ''never'' going to learn, and that his immaturity was now ruining her life.

*** Nothing illegal? I'd say spiking someone's food with something you know they're allergic to is pretty damn illegal. Even if Stu hadn't choked--which was admittedly somewhat unexpected--consuming allergens can easily land a person in the hospital and can even be deadly. He deliberately tried to make Stu sick, and whether he intended to or not, did objectively endanger Stu's life.

*** Nothing illegal? I'd say spiking someone's food with something you know they're allergic to is pretty damn illegal. Even if Stu hadn't choked--which was admittedly somewhat unexpected--consuming allergens can easily land a person in the hospital and can even be deadly.