quintessence made easy

Could one simply replace the quintessence Lagrange density \(\mathcal{L} = \nabla^\mu\varphi\nabla_\mu\varphi - V(\varphi)\) with \(\mathcal{L} = \partial^\mu\varphi\partial_\mu\varphi - V(\varphi)\) with the argument that partial derivative replace covariant derivatives in the case of scalar fields?