Richard Curtis, author of Four Weddings and a Funeral, said yesterday it was “stupid and wrong” to make jokes about people’s heights in his films after he was confronted by his daughter.
The 66-year-old director said he regrets a lot of his work and was “inattentive” and “not as smart” as he should have been.
He added that he would never use the words “fat” and “chubby” again.
The weight of Renée Zellweger’s character Bridget Jones was addressed in the film, while the Prime Minister’s personal assistant Natalie in Love Actually, played by Martine McCutcheon, was portrayed as the “chubby one” with “tree trunk thighs”.
But Curtis said those jokes were no longer funny when quizzed by his daughter Scarlett at The Times and Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival.
Her mother is the broadcaster Emma Freud and her great-great-grandfather is Sigmund Freud. The 28-year-old activist, artist and writer previously described Sigmund as “sexist” and “horrible”. Her maternal grandfather, Clement, was exposed as a pedophile in 2016.
Richard Curtis, author of Four Weddings and a Funeral, says his daughter Scarlett (right) made it clear to him that his jokes about women and people’s height in his films were no longer funny
The weight of Renée Zellweger’s character Bridget Jones was discussed in the hit 2001 film
Scarlett made her TV writing debut this year in the second season of Amazon Prime Video’s teen romance The Summer I Turned Pretty, with feminist activist and author Richard Eden of the Chron saying: “It really was my dream job .”
Curtis said his daughter talked some sense into him, The Times reported.
“I remember how shocked I was five years ago when Scarlett said to me, ‘You can never use the word ‘fat’ again,” he said. “Wow, you were right. In my generation, people call someone chubby [was funny] – There were jokes about it in there. “These jokes aren’t funny anymore.”
Ms. Zellweger told British Vogue in 2016 that she never understood Bridget Jones’ fascination with weight.
“Bridget is a completely normal weight and I never understood why that was so important,” she said. “No male actor would face such scrutiny if they did the same thing for a role.”
Curtis also spoke of regretting not having a black character in Notting Hill and “not being ahead of the curve”, but that his work was never intentionally intended to cause harm.
But he defended himself by saying he wrote a gay couple in the 1994 film “Four Weddings and a Funeral.”
Curtis said he felt “stupid and wrong” for thinking he couldn’t write about these parts because of his “very diverse school” and “a group of university friends.”
He said: “I felt like I, my casting director, my producers were just not looking out.”
Curtis was born in Wellington, New Zealand and lived in Sweden and the Philippines before moving to the UK at the age of 11 where he was educated in Harrow. He then earned a first-class Bachelor of Arts in English Language and Literature from the University of Oxford.
Curtis has criticized his own work before – describing how his films began to look like “historical documents” last January.
Speaking to Craig Oliver on his Desperately Seeking Wisdom podcast, The Blackadder and Mr Bean creator said: “In all my conversations with my kids, now they don’t like 20 per cent of my jokes because they think they’re old-fashioned and wrong. ” somehow.
Scarlett Curtis, 28, made her TV writing debut this year in the second season of teen romance The Summer I Got Pretty on Amazon Prime Video
Ms. Zellweger (pictured in the film Bridget Jones’s Diary) told British Vogue in 2016 that she never understood the fascination with the figure’s weight, saying it was completely normal
Curtis previously admitted that the lack of diversity in the 2003 Christmas classic Love Actually made him feel “uncomfortable” and “a bit stupid.”
The Prime Minister’s personal assistant, Natalie in Love Actually, played by Martine McCutcheon, was famously portrayed as a “chubby” with “tree trunk thighs”.
The screenwriter defended himself for having a gay couple (pictured: Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell) in the 1994 film Four Weddings and a Funeral.
A gay couple stars in Four Weddings and a Funeral (Pictured: Simon Callow, who plays Gareth in the film)
“I’m really interested in how a generation that grew up to be passionate, angry and pedantic about these issues can change things for the better.”
Last November, reflecting on the film’s 20th anniversary, he admitted that Love Indeed’s lack of diversity now makes him feel “uncomfortable” and “a bit stupid.”
Speaking to host Diane Sawyer for the ABC special The Laughter and Secrets of Love Actually: 20 Years Later, he said the 2003 Christmas classic was “dated” in some moments.
“There are things you would change, but thank God society is changing. So my film is bound to feel dated at some moments,” he said.
“I mean, there are things about the film, you know, the lack of diversity makes me feel uncomfortable and a little bit stupid.”
Scarlett has previously spoken about the “long line of very dodgy men” in her family, with her maternal relatives marred by controversy and scandal.
“There’s a long line of very shady men in my family,” she said in a 2019 interview with the Daily Telegraph.
“That’s why I’m such a feminist, trying to make amends for the sins of fathers.”
She told how the family avoided talking about her “sexist” great-great-grandfather Sigmund’s childhood.
She said, “My grandpa.” [Clement] We had a really complicated relationship and we were forbidden to mention Sigmund because he was so obsessed with going it alone. Mom wasn’t interested. As a child I actively looked after him.’