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What is a Bridget Jones movie without Colin Firth, aka the dashing Mr Mark Darcy?
That’s what fans of the hit movies based on Helen Fielding’s bestselling novels were asking when Firth’s name was left off the cast list of the upcoming fourth film, Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy.
Fearing Firth’s beloved character might have been killed off, fans threatened to boycott the new film.
But here’s where we need to insert a spoiler alert for those who haven’t read the novels: In Fielding’s books, Mark Darcy does actually die while working overseas as a human rights lawyer, leaving Bridget a widowed mother of two young children, son Billy and daughter Mabel.
And that’s where things get complicated, because new pictures from the set of Mad About The Boy show that Darcy is still very much alive, at least in the film version.
… Or is he? Is it, perhaps, a dream sequence – or have the writers decided to veer off script and keep Firth’s character to keep the fans happy?
The set pictures show Renee Zellweger, 55, filming a scene with Firth, 63, in a London street as he tenderly caressed her face.
As Darcy, Firth looks as dapper as ever in a suit and tie, while Zellweger is dressed in her trademark hodgepodge style.
According to one insider, Darcy’s appearance in the film had to be kept as a huge secret, which meant leaving Firth’s name off the official cast list (until now … the cat is out of the bag!)
‘’Colin was always going to appear in the movie but it was supposed to be a secret,’’ a source told The Daily Mail.
When the last Bridget Jones movie, Bridget Jones’ Baby (2016) left off, Zellweger’s character was seen attending a memorial service for her old flame Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant), presumed dead after a plane crash.
In that film she had settled down, married and had a baby with Darcy, appearing to have finally achieved her happily ever after.
So when Firth’s name was absent from the new film, fans raged.
‘’Bridget Jones 4 without Colin Firth … no thank you,’’ one fan wrote on X.
‘’Bridget Jones 4 without Colin Firth, no thanks, pointless, he’s the only reason I watched and liked the last 3 films,’’ grumbled another.
‘’I’m sorry, but what’s the purpose (of making) another Bridget Jones, most of all without Colin and his Mark Darcy, Bridget’s only love,’’ wondered a third.
Earlier this year, some plot points were revealed by The Mail on Sunday, with Bridget negotiating a complex love triangle with Daniel Cleaver – who didn’t really die in a plane crash – a young man called Rockstar (played by The White Lotus star Leo Woodall) and her son’s phys ed teacher, Mr Walker (played by Love Actually and 12 Years A Slave star Chiwetel Ejiofor).
So where does Mark Darcy fit in amongst all these players? Is he alive, or is he dead and appearing to Bridget in a dream sequence?
Have the writers of the film stuck to the book version, or gone off on a Darcy-friendly tangent?
Sadly, it will be a while before fans find the answer to that question – Mad About The Boy isn’t due for release until Valentine’s Day 2025.
It will be a silver screen return of sorts for Renee Zellweger, who hasn’t appeared in a film since her award-winning turn in Judy, the 2019 biopic of Judy Garland.
When Mad About The Boy began filming in London in May, a source told The Mail on Sunday Zellweger was ‘’excited’’ to be reprising the role that made her famous.
‘’There was some uncertainty about whether it would get off the ground, but the movie is coming,’’ the source said, referring to the 2023 writer’s strike.
‘’Renee is excited about bringing Bridget back. She adores the character so much. Bridget Jones fever is expected to sweep across London this spring.’’
