Renée Zellweger: Bridget Jones characters would be in trouble today over work romance
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Speaking before fourth film’s release, Hugh Grant says his Daniel Cleaver character would be ‘re-educated’ by HR. The workplace romance shown in Bridget Jones’s Diary would not withstand modern-day scrutiny from human resources, Renée Zellweger has said.
Speaking with co-star Hugh Grant before the release of the fourth Bridget Jones film, Zellweger was asked if Jones’s boss was exploiting his powerful position when he made overtures to a junior employee. She told British Vogue: “I’m sure HR would have some stern rules down at the publishing house these days, don’t you think?”.
In the 2001 film Daniel Cleaver, played by Grant, seduces Bridget, a 32-year-old bachelorette, at a London publishing house. Zellweger suggested HR would have held a meeting, and spoken about “how you engage” with others. And “Daniel would’ve had to be re-educated”, added Grant.
To research the role, Zellweger said she worked at the publisher Picador for two months, flying under the radar as “Bridget Cavendish” as she filed newspaper clippings, including articles about herself. After its release more than two decades ago, the first film in the Bridget Jones series, an adaptation of Helen Fielding’s bestseller, banked a then record £7.8m in three days. The film was followed by Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, in 2004, and in 2016, the success of the third instalment, Bridget Jones’s Baby, made producers Working Title the first British film company to take home $1bn in the UK.
