Colin Firth ‘felt like a ghost’ on set of new Bridget Jones film
Bridget is back, but this time she's struggling as a widow - and without Firth's Mark Darcy.
It’s no small feat for a director to helm a Bridget Jones sequel – and certainly not when it’s the fourth film, 24 years since the franchise’s onscreen debut and nine years after the beloved heroine’s last outing.
But Michael Morris and the movie’s writing team of Bridget’s creator, author Helen Fielding, Dan Mazer and Abi Morgan, are up for the challenge of shifting the popular heroine from the recognisable surroundings of 30-something singledom to those of a 51-year-old mother-of-two – and widow.
When I meet Morris at Claridge’s for the film junket, we’re actually left alone in a cavernous hotel room to get stuck into discussing all things Bridget, comparing past with present.
The 51-year-old filmmaker, who previously directed Andrea Riseborough to a best actress Oscar nomination in American drama To Leslie, is only on his second film with Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.
By his own admission, this wasn’t the movie (or genre) he saw himself doing next until a chance meeting with Fielding at a mutual friend’s house, where she revealed the film was in development and the progression of Bridget’s story ‘immediately sparked my interest’.
Morris’s background is in theatre – he was artistic director at The Old Vic for three years from 1999 – as well as TV, where he has directed and executive produced the likes of Better Call Saul, House of Cards, Billions and 13 Reasons Why.
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Previous Page Next Page Bridget is now tackling her life as a single mum with different priorities than before (Picture: Jay Maidment/Universal)Bridget Jones is maybe not the expected next project for him, but his affection for the character and dedication to getting it right shine through during our conversation.
He recognises the previous films as ‘fun, funny, frothy, kind of romantic [and] at times iconic’, with the original as ‘a cultural plank of this country’.
‘It’s dated in some ways, but it’s completely part of our lives.’
Adapted from Fielding’s 2013 novel Mad About the Boy, Morris knew that ‘how we tell her story has to change’, given the devastation of Bridget’s new situation.
‘And there’s no one better to do that with than Renée Zellweger, who at a moment’s notice can be the funniest physical comedian that I’ve worked with, but then can get absolutely real emotionally as well,’ he adds.
Director Michael Morris on set with Zellweger, whose physical comedy talents he praises to the rafters (Picture: Jay Maidment/Universal) Mark, who finally got together with Bridget in Bridget Jones’s Baby (2016), has been dead four years when Mad About the Boy begins (Picture: Moviestore/Rex/Shutterstock)The headline of the movie is Bridget without Colin Firth’s Mark Darcy. The pair were finally seen settling down together at the end of 2016’s Bridget Jones’s Baby, and in the interim had children Billy and Mabel. Mark is killed offscreen ahead of the events of Mad About the Boy, which takes place four years later and sees Bridget’s family and friends encouraging her back out onto the dating scene.
In the trailer, fans have already seen glimpses of Bridget remembering Mark in new scenes, so it’s no spoiler to say that Firth does appear in a few heartbreaking scenes in the new film, which Morris has previously described as ‘a comedy of grief’.
Comment nowAre you going to see Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy?Comment NowMorris was especially struck by ‘brilliant’ Firth’s first day on set and a comment he made that reflected on the legacy and life of the Bridget Jones films for its creatives.
‘The first day he worked with us was the scene at the beginning when they’re doing bedtimes for the kids. And this is not [in] a house that’s ever been seen, it was all created and designed for the film. But it was supposed to be the house that they had lived in together just before he died – so it’s filled with photos,’ Morris explains – something usually mocked up cleverly with Photoshop for movies.
Firth filmed a few scenes for the new film to add emotional heft, saying he felt ‘like a ghost’ when he first stepped on set (Picture: Laurie Sparham) Bridget with the couple’s young children, Mabel (Mila Jankovic) and Billy (Casper Knopf) (Picture: Alex Bailey/Universal)‘And [Firth] said, “All these pictures that are on set, they’re real because we’ve been doing this for 25 years.” So as he walked through this house, which is surrounded with all this evidence of their lives, he said it was honesty like being a ghost. Not that he’s playing a ghost, he’s much more playing a memory – but he said it was a bit like that because you walk through this space where you’re kind of not part of it, but you are.’
Morris also remembers some ‘really emotional moments’ on set with the two of them together – ‘because it’s them’. Morris doesn’t take it lightly that Mark is no more, seeing him as half of one of the most iconic couples in British pop culture being taken away.
It’s a particular challenge for Bridget when she ‘is just all joy and love and positivity and falling over and standing up again, and that’s what the journey was here,’ he says of the Bridget we see in Mad About the Boy.
Another undeniable component of that celebrated relationship is, of course, third wheel Hugh Grant’s lothario Daniel Cleaver. Back from the dead and up to his old tricks, he’s still chasing a stream of women (now far too young) – but this problematic tendency for a man now in his 60s is nicely addressed in the film, without giving Cleaver any kind of personality makeover for 2025.
Another blast from Bridget’s past is former lover Daniel Cleaver, played by Hugh Grant (Picture: Moviestore/Rex/Shutterstock)For Morris this approach is because he’s ‘a contemporary filmmaker, meaning I’m not making a 2001 film’.
‘I think the lens with which Daniel’s character is shown [reveals] him to be almost a little from another time. The film’s perspective – I hope, and I think – isn’t necessarily the kind of old-fashioned Cleaver perspective. We see him, we enjoy him and we understand who he is, but it does feel like the film gives us scenes to show he’s from another time, and that’s part of his journey in this film, is like, “What am I doing?”.’
Grant has already shared Cleaver’s backstory – a teenaged son he’s estranged from after cheating on his mother with her sister – but it doesn’t stop him flirting with any woman in his vicinity. That includes Briget, the ‘very, very naughty nun’ he now occasionally (and unexpectedly) babysits for in some of the film’s best scenes.
‘Hugh is – I very rarely use this word – but Hugh is genius at what he does,’ declares Morris, who also calls him ‘one of the funniest people I’ve met but also extremely focused’.
The Heretic star, who has been enjoying an enviable resurgence in his career in recent years, previously said he had made tweaks to the Mad About the Boy screenplay and Daniel’s arc to make sure it could justify a return for the character.
The lothario is back once more, unchanged, but with some interesting context (Picture: Miramax/Universal/Kobal/Rex/Shutterstock) Grant, pictured supporting Zellweger at the London premiere, collaborated with Morris and the writers to make Cleaver work perfectly for 2025 (Picture: Getty)Morris reveals that Daniel’s scenes in the movie were already in place before Grant’s involvement – ‘his arc is absolutely what it was’. But the actor undertook painstaking prep work and ‘months’ of correspondence ahead of filming to tweak things.
‘He’s also just brilliantly inventive. One of my favourite moments – I’m very happy to tell you it was his – is when Bridget comes back [and he’s] babysitting, doing stickers in the book, and he [holds it up and] says, “What should she wear?” That’s all Hugh! That’s the kind of thing that Hugh is so brilliant about, understanding where Daniel can surprise us.’
Morris and the screenwriters had quite a task on their hands trying to squeeze in all the returning characters, alongside new ones, but the key fresh additions are Bridget’s new love interests: 29-year-old toy boy park worker Roxster (Leo Woodall) and Chiwetel Ejiofor’s uptight Mr Wallaker, science teacher to Billy. Morris calls trying to make sure these characters could live up to the Cleaver and Darcy comparisons they are bound to face ‘one of the great joys and challenges of this’.
Firstly, it was a ‘very conscious decision’ that there is no love triangle entanglement in Mad About the Boy.
‘I really wanted to make a film about a woman moving through a certain moment in her life to get to a place where she’s ready to move on. And that’s very different from a love triangle – the love triangle in the first one was iconic, but I still needed to cast two actors who could both be, in weird ways, viable,’ says Morris.
Young Roxster (Leo Woodall) is one of two new men on the scene for Bridget, with Morris knowing they had to be ‘viable’ – and stand up against inevitable comparisons (Picture: Jay Maidment/Universal) Chiwetel Ejiofor, as Mr Wallaker, ‘brings so much gravitas’, says Morris (Picture: Jay Maidment/Universal)That meant Woodall’s performance had to reveal more than ‘just this gorgeous guy’ who’s never going to be seen as a candidate for a proper relationship.
‘What I love about the way Leo plays Roxster is that he’s kind of great, he’s kind of lovely. And then he does this thing that happens now, which I think Bridget hasn’t been particularly exposed to before, of just disappearing. And it’s like, what happened? How do you deal with that?’
Morris praises the One Day and White Lotus star as ‘exceptional because he’s able to be funny and not funny at exactly the same time. He won’t ever chase a joke just for the joke.’
Meanwhile, Oscar nominee Ejiofor has ‘got some essential Britishness about him’.
‘I always saw that character as being connected to the Lake District and the glory of Britain, and Chiwetel brings that, [and] he brings so much gravitas to the roles he plays.’
‘So I felt like we scored really, really high when we were able to get these guys.’
Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy is in cinemas on Thursday, February 13.
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