Bridget Jones actor Renée Zellweger has called out the mass “fixation” on the titular character’s weight on the 25th anniversary of the film’s release.
Bridget, who was originally written as a character in Helen Fielding’s Pride and Prejudice-inspired novel, references her weight often on page and screen.
This is a part of the character’s broader self-scrutiny. She also bulk-buys self-help books and practices “oozing charisma” at parties, which makes D’Arcy’s line – “I like you just the way you are” – so touching.
But while some took the character’s weight comments as a sign of how far diet culture can push us, coverage of Renée was less nuanced. One publication mentioned how the actor “packed on pounds” for the 2004 sequel, for instance.
In a recent Q&A held at the Tribeca Film Festival, a journalist asked the star: “Why the hell were we so stupid to think that Bridget Jones was plus-size?”
Per USA Today Entertainment, Renée agreed, replying: “What you said is so true.”
She added: “The fixation goes back to what [director Sharon Maguire] said earlier: Most romantic comedy heroines are polished and fit a particular paradigm for beauty in that moment.”
Bridget, meanwhile, “was a normal girl and she looked like her lifestyle. She liked to have an extra helping, and she liked her chardonnay. She didn’t go the gym every day, and she’s gorgeous anyway”.
Renée continued, saying the beloved character was “so very herself, that makes her more attractive and it broke a norm. When people talk about her weight, there’s nothing here to fix... She shifted our expectations of what a leading lady can look like”.
Richard CurtisBridget Jones, Notting Hill, and Love, Actually director Richard Curtis has previously apologised for making jokes about women characters’ weight in his movies.
“I think I was behind, you know, behind the curve, and those jokes aren’t any longer funny, so I don’t feel I was malicious at the time, but I think I was unobservant and not as, you know, as clever as I should have been,” he told Today back in 2023.
It’s not the first time Renée has spoken out about comments on Bridget’s weight, either.
In a 2016 British Vogue interview, the actor said: “Bridget is a perfectly normal weight, and I’ve never understood why it matters so much. No male actor would get such scrutiny if he did the same thing [gain weight] for a role.”
Bengali (Bangladesh) · 
English (United States) ·