Anne Frank Goodrich And Hackett Character Analysis

Anne Frank: The Biography, by Melissa Muller, proves that Goodrich and Hackett are not justified in using dramatic license in The Diary of Anne Frank because they changed the character roles, removed the emotions of the SS officer, and removed the characters from the play from real life.

Goodrich and Hackett changed Mr. Van Daan’s and Mr. Frank’s role, and this allows the readers to see who they really are not. Mr. Van Daan’s role is not shown as a helper, but a man who does not care about anyone. In the play, he was shown as a selfish man who loves to eat food. He made sure he got the most food , even though there are seven more people to feed. When Mr. Van Daan goes downstairs, “He goes to the food safe and again lights a match. Then he

cautiously opens the safe, taking out a half loaf of bread” (Goodrich and Hackett 424). This displays that Mr. Vaan makes sure that he gets more food than everyone else because he steals food in the middle of the night. The stage directions inform the readers the he does this because he only cares about himself, but the others need food to live as well because they run low on food. This makes the readers see that Mr. Van Daan’s role is significantly different than real life because he was shown as a greedy man who only cares about himself.

But in the play by Melissa Muller shows that he cared about others in the Secret Annex and his family, which shows the readers that he is completely different then who Goodrich and Hackett made him because they wanted to make more tension. Although Goodrich and Hackett changed Mr. Van Daan’s role to a selfish man to add tension to the Secret Annex, this gives humanity a different view of him in a negative way for years on. From the biography by Melissa Müller, Mr. Frank’s role was to help the others, but Goodrich and Hackett made him a leader instead. When the SS officers went through the Secret Annex, Mr. Frank talked about him being in World War I. Mr. Frank says, “I was a reserve officer in the First World War” (Müller 9). This quote means that Mr. Frank was in the First World War and tries to help the others by talking to the other SS officer [Silberbauer]. Also, he is trying to help the others by reasoning with the officers that he was helping in the war, but this war made them go into the Great Depression. Müller says that he was helping the others through the arrest to prevent it, or save more time before they were taken away to the concentration camp. Another thing is that he was shown better at

helping others than being a leader because he didn’t step up to be a leader in the arrest scene by trying to stop them, but reason with them instead. Because Goodrich and Hackett changed the character roles, they also changed how the SS officers were shown in the arrest scene then real life.

The readers do not see the true emotions of the SS officer, which causes the reader to notice how they truly felt when they take the people from the Secret Annex. From the play, the readers see no emotions from the SS officers, which makes the readers seem like they are bad people. When they were celebrating Hanukah, the stage directions show that there were tires screeching by the building and then loud noises began with a lot of banging on the door to get them out of the building. The men say, “Open up! You in there! Open up! Quickly! Quickly! Quickly!” (Goodrich and Hackett 433). The SS officers tell the people in the Secret Annex to open up and get out quickly before they barge in. Also, they want to get the jews quickly so they can send them to the concentration camp rapidly. This shows that they have no interaction with the SS officers, except when they told them to get their stuff to leave for the concentration camps. This makes the readers feel like the SS officers do not care about taking jews, but in Müller’s text, this shows the opposite of what they did with the people in the Secret Annex. Müller’s text has shown the readers the true emotions of the SS officers. After they finished talking, the officer felt guilty about taking them away and seeing the map about the allied powers. Mr. Frank finished talking to the SS officer and “Silberbauer struggles with himself…Is he about to lose his self -control? Has something here touched him?” (Müller 9). This quote shows that the SS officers cared about what Mr. Frank said to them and he was touched about what he has done to the country by serving in WWI. Also, the SS officer was going to lose his dignity by feeling bad about the people in the Secret Annex and was felling horrible about taking innocent people from there lives. It’s bad that Goodrich and Hackett took out the emotions of the officers because this took out a large chunk of who they were in our eyes. Another thing is that people will think badly of them and they were not meant to care about the jews, but you can see that they feel guilty about taking them and how the jews live while in hiding when the Nazi’s take other people to the concentration camps. Even though Goodrich and Hackett took out information about the SS officers because they didn’t want the readers to see what happened, but they show society that their true feelings are hidden by their changes. It was a loss that Goodrich and Hackett took out the emotions of the SS officers, but they also took out two important people who were in the Secret Annex when they were arrested.
Mr.

Kraler and Miep were taken out of the arrest scene, which does not allow the readers to see how they actin real life when they arrest the jews. Mr. Kraler was taken out of the arrest scene which makes the readers wonder what happened to him after the others were taken away. When they were in the Secret Annex, he was downstairs working with the other resistance members or workers when the Nazis barged in. He was shocked that they found out they were hiding jews as he lead up the Nazis to them. The SS officers order Kugler [Mr. Kraler] to lead the way and “Kugler obeys…the men follow them, their pistols drawn” (Müller 6). This means that the SS officers came into Mr. Frank’s building and asked Kugler where the jews were. He obeyed the SS officers by taking them up the flight of stairs to the people in the Secret Annex while he has a pistol behind his body. The reader see how different the arrest scene was because Mr. Kraler was sick in the Annex because he didn’t have a doctor to treat himself because most jews were doctors. He also left before the arrest scene, but in the biography he was there working with the other resistance members. Although Mr. Kraler was shown as a ill man to add tension in the Secret Annex, he was perfectly fine while working downstairs in Mr. Frank’s building. From the play, Miep was not in the Secret Annex when the others were arrested. When Miep spreads the news about the liberation, she soon left before the SS officers took them. She went to

go see her husband and get more food for them. The stage directions say, “Mrs. Frank indicates that he [Mr. Frank] has forgotten to bolt the door after Miep” (Goodrich and Hackett 428). This shows that Miep left after she told them the news and no one locked the door after her. Also, Mr. Frank forgot to bolt the door after she left which makes Mrs. Frank scared that someone will come in so she points to the door. Goodrich and Hackett took out Miep because she lived through the World War II, but she was actually alive through the arrest scene. She wasn’t arrested though because she was from the same place as the SS officer which was Vienna. When they took out this interaction, this gives the reader a different perspective of how she lived through this with the others as they were taken away. From the play, the readers see how Mr. Kraler and Miep were taken out of the arrest scene, which shows the readers that they are lucky that they were not there to get arrested, but they actually were there.

The Diary of Anne Frank, by Goodrich and Hackett shows that they were not justified in using dramatic license from the Anne Frank: The Biography, by Melissa Müller by changing the character roles, removed the emotions of the SS officers, and removed the characters from the play from real life.