Before Hugh Grant started his heel turn in films like “Paddington 2” and the recently release A24 horror film “Heretic,” he was mostly known as a romantic lead. With films like “Four Weddings and a Funeral” and “Notting Hill,” Grant warmed his way into the hearts of countless with his dashing good looks and witty charm. One of his most memorable romantic roles was in “Bridget Jones‘s Diary,” which spawned two sequels and now an upcoming third one that Grant has been coaxed into returning for after skipping the last one, “Bridget Jones’s Baby.” Discussing the upcoming entry in the franchise, Grant shared on The Graham Norton Show how the film will not only provide laughs, as per usual, but also an emotional underpinning that will feel new for the typically frothy films.
“As well as being extremely funny, it’s very, very sad,” Grant said, adding, “but absolutely no role for Daniel Cleaver as far as I could see.”
In the first two films, made in 2001 and 2004, Cleaver served as an antagonist to the romance between Jones, played by Renée Zellwegger, and barrister Mark Darcy, played by Colin Firth, but eventually faded into the background as their love flourished. In the latest “Bridget Jones” novel from Helen Fielding, entitled “Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy,” Cleaver does not appear, but the team behind the film adaptation were determined to “cram” him in anyway.
“It’s actually a very good and moving script,” Grant said of the adaptation, written by Fielding. “And I say this as someone who’s horrid about scripts. This was brilliant.”
Following Bridget in the aftermath of her husband’s death, Grant gives credit to Fielding’s writing mirroring a tragedy in her own life as the reason the story resonates so strongly.
“She had a sad story,” said Grant. “She got married to an American screenwriter, she had children, then he died and she raised the children by herself.”
Grant went on to explain how Fielding began writing a novel about this subject and came to realize the main character was “a bit like Bridget”.
“So she made it into a ‘Bridget Jones’ book,” he said.
Working off this concept, Grant believed there was “absolutely no role” for his character, Daniel, in the fourth film, but sat down with the producers to figure out a way for him to return.
“I felt that what they proposed was fine, but not great,” said Grant on The Graham Norton Show. “And I felt that he needed a third dimension. He’s in his 60s now, you can’t just have him smoothing his way down King’s Road eyeing up young girls. Something needs to have happened to him in the interim. So we invented a rather good — I invented a rather good — interim story.”
New characters featured in the film will be played by Chiwetel Ejiofor (“12 Years A Slave”) and Leo Woodall (“One Day”), rumored to be playing Bridget’s younger love interest as she wades back out into the dating pool.
Universal Pictures is set to release “Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy” on Valentine’s Day 2025.
