The British romantic comedies of the 1990s and 2000s have a first and last name: Richard Curtis (Wellington, New Zealand, 66 years old). As a screenwriter, Curtis is the author of the unforgettable 1994 film Four Weddings and a Funeral, starring Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell, and Notting Hill (1999), which tells the love story between a bookseller played by Grant and a… says Hollywood actress, played by Julia Roberts. In 2001, she brought to the screen the story of one of the romantic genre’s quintessential anti-heroines: the unclassifiable (and now heavily criticized) Bridget Jones. And in 2003, he not only wrote the script, but also directed a classic romantic Christmas film: “Love Actually,” a choral love story in which several protagonists intertwine their lives weeks before Christmas. This adopted Englishman – he came to London when he was just 11 – undoubtedly brings to his scripts that very British humor that, although romantic, allows his comedies to be not just cheesy but also funny and insightful, which makes him In the same newspaper he was christened the “master of intelligent sentimental comedy”.
However, looking back, Curtis himself finds a series of mistakes that he would not make again. Don’t be alarmed, Curtis continues to bet on happy endings where everyone finds the right thing, but as he recently confessed at the Cheltenham Literary Festival and when the interviewer confronted him about some of his films, he was neither more nor less than his own daughter Scarlett , 28, the writer and director believes that some of the most successful films presented a “stupid and wrong” image on issues such as diversity or the treatment of their female characters.
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For example, the screenwriter complains that in Notting Hill there is a film set in a neighborhood where every year a huge street carnival with Caribbean music and dances is celebrated in honor of the community that settled there at the beginning of the last century and where “the British Black Civil Rights Movement,” as his own daughter put it, did not have a single racially motivated person in its cast. And Curtis admits his mistake. Curious: The so-called gentrification of the London district, which is now one of the most expensive in the British capital and where the majority of privileged white people now live, came to its big breakthrough when Curtis decided to locate the travel bookstore there run by Hugh Grant. .
Renée Zellweger in a still from the film “Bridget Jones’s Diary” directed by Sharon Maguire.
“There has been some controversy over the last few years about the way your films treat women,” Scarlett Curtis said from the stage. His father did not contest the major. And they began to debate one of the figures who, through the prism of recent feminist movements, has caused the most conflict: Bridget Jones. Considered a feminist heroine at the beginning of the last century, the character of this character has not stood the test of time well. Coinciding with the 25th anniversary of the book’s international edition, which took place this year, some figures such as the writer Elizabeth Egan in the New York Times attacked the novel and therefore the film, which they said was “out of date” “vile” way, and both her heroine and the millions of readers who found in her a reference for contemporary femininity and a role model, in her opinion, “deserved better luck.” One of the most discussed topics is the relationship between Bridget Jones and her weight. Scarlett Curtis questioned the description of the character played by actress Renée Zellweger, saying she had “tree trunk thighs” despite having a normal figure.
For his part, Curtis said he did not view such comments with malice at the time. “I don’t think I was as observant and intelligent as I should have been.” The other criticism came from the portrayal of the character of Natalie, the secretary to the British Prime Minister (played again by Hugh Grant) in “In Love Actually.” Throughout the film, the jokes about Natalie’s character always revolve around her weight. “I remember how shocked I was five years ago when Scarlett told me, ‘You can never use the word ‘fat’ like that again.” Wow, you were right. In my generation, calling someone chubby [era divertido]; in Love Actually there were jokes about it. “These jokes aren’t funny anymore.”
Curtis said bluntly that he regretted a lot about his job. “I wish I had been on the front lines,” he said. In his defence, he admitted that he had written about love between two men in Four Weddings and a Funeral and that Simon Callow, who played the character Gareth, had told him that it was the first time he had been offered the role of a man was a gay man who did not die of AIDS. However, he would have liked to have done more: “I think I came from a very academic childhood and clung to the feeling that I wouldn’t know how to write stories like this.” I think I was just stupid. It’s like my casting director, my producers and I never looked outside.”