Bridget Jones Director Says Renee Zellweger ‘Came to Set’ in Character

Director Michael Morris didn’t have to worry about Renée Zellweger rediscovering her role as Bridget Jones in Mad About the Boy — she was back in character before he even called action.

“It is absolutely true to say that she walks in as Bridget and there’s something really profoundly affecting about that,” Morris, 51, exclusively shared with Us Weekly. “Because we all expected Renee to come [to set]. … That is not what happens. Bridget comes in, and there’s a massive difference in the way that she walks, the way that she sits, the way that she leans. It’s Bridget.”

Morris — who called Zellweger a “wonderful, warm human being” and “really magnificent actress” — said that everyone working on the movie, from the “makeup team” to the “craft service team,” had an “out of body experience” watching the Oscar-winner mosey around set as her rom-com counterpart.

“Like, ‘I’m talking to Bridget Jones behind the scenes of the set of Bridget Jones, what? My head is exploding! This is so weird,’” he recalled thinking. “It honestly felt like that. So from the very start, Bridget was there and it just makes everything better. Because it means you can just get into it.”

Zellweger settling back into Bridget with ease makes sense — she’s already nailed the role in the three previous films based on Helen Fielding’s ‘90s newspaper serial: 2001’s Bridget Jones’s Diary, 2004’s, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason and 2016’s Bridget Jones’s Baby. Now, the lovable on-and-off singleton is back and ready to make Us laugh, cry, blush and inhale our ice cream (and wine) as we reunite with her following the death of great love Mark Darcy (Colin Firth).

While Mad About the Boy introduces Bridget as a widowed mom of two dipping her toe back in the dating pool — Mark has been dead for four years by the time the movie begins — the beloved character can be felt from start to finish. Morris told Us he was well aware of how important the character is to fans, and wanted to ensure that Firth’s brief cameo landed just right.

“It was one of the most emotional moments of the filming, seeing Renée and Colin together and knowing how brief their time was going to be on set,” he shared, noting that the set designers placed “real pictures” of the duo throughout Bridget’s home to make the loss feel more authentic. It was a touch that Firth himself appreciated.

“Unlike most movies, they’re real pictures, because they grew up together doing these films. So there’s all these real moments,” Morris recalled. “And [Colin] walked through the set on the way to where we needed him and he just said, ‘The movie you’re making, I felt like a memory because I’m not in this house, but I’m sort of passing through it for this scene.’ And it was just gorgeous.”

Feeling the “absence” and “loss” of Mark was inevitable — “The audience has a 24-year relationship with Colin Firth as Mark Darcy,” Morris reminded Us. The director also had the added challenge of building a new world for Bridget that could help the character begin her next chapter.

“She’s never lived in this house, she’s never had children, she’s never been in this moment,” he said. “It’s reinventing. That was something we had to do because that’s the story that we’re telling.”

One advantage Morris had in his corner? Being a genuine long-time fan of the franchise, which he said helped him feel seen as he navigated his own young adult life.

“I remember in 2001 seeing the first film — just going to the movies and seeing it, and I was in my 20s probably, when it came out, around the same age as Bridget trying to make my own way, figuring out what I was gonna do, how I was gonna do it,” he said. “And so with all these sort of fabulous men that were in that first film with Colin and Hugh [Grant] and James Faulkner and everybody else, I leaned toward Bridget. That’s who my stand-in was.”

Morris recognized that if he could feel seen by Bridget, women certainly would, too. “I didn’t [even] have half of the real touch points with Bridget that so many women have,” he noted. “And God knows society was not asking me to chronicle my weight in my diary like it was asking women to do.”

That’s partly why Morris feels Bridget Jones — even 24 years after the first film hit theaters — still resonates so deeply today. In the so-called golden age of “superhero and horror movies,” romantic comedies find their focus on “real people” and “real life.”

“We can have the really shiny and possibly perfect version of rom-coms where everyone looks gorgeous and they live on, you know, a tropical island with Louis Vuitton suitcases. That’s one version of a rom-com,” he explained. “But then there’s another version of a rom-com that reflects us more, and the messiness of it all, and the kind of the real life rom-com in a way, which is more Bridget.”

Morris himself has plenty of experience with every genre across the board. After getting his start with the family drama Brothers & Sisters, he moved on to shows like 13 Reasons Why and Better Call Saul. That range, Morris said, only helped him when it came to joining the Bridget Jones family.

“If you’re going to do comedy, I feel like you want to include elements that are not comedic, on the face,” he told Us. “It’s a little bit like when you’re cooking. You do salt, you do a little bit of sweet, a little bit of acid, you need to have a full flavor. And I think the really exciting thing about rom-coms, [is] actually when you take it apart, it isn’t a clear genre.”

Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy is streaming on Peacock.