Renée Zellweger weighs in on big Bridget Jones rumour ahead of fourth film, Mad About The Boy

Bridget Jones is back – and ahead of the highly-anticipated fourth film, its lead star revealed a startling fact about her infamous, giant pants.

IN LONDON

When you think of Bridget Jones, the image of her giant underwear is usually just a beat behind.

First introduced way back in 2001, in a scene where chaotic singleton Bridget is preparing for a date in Bridget Jones’s Diary, they were instantly iconic.

Arguably the most famous underwear in the world.

Twenty-four years later, and with the fourth instalment of the beloved franchise about to hit our screens, lead star Renée Zellweger told news.com.au she is trying to get to the bottom (mind the pun) of a rumour she’s heard about the fate of the “big pants”.

“I’ve heard that Hugh Grant [has them],” the actress revealed with a laugh.

“I don’t know – we’ll have to investigate.”

The pair had a steamy romance in Bridget Jones’s Diary.

Grant and Zellweger at the world premiere of the fourth Bridget Jones film in London. Picture: Yui Mok/PA Images via Getty Images

Given that it was Grant as Bridget’s on-off lover, impossibly charming playboy Daniel Cleaver, who first unveiled the “absolutely enormous” underpants to the world in the original film, his taking possession of them would be oddly fitting.

Without giving away any major spoilers, fans will be delighted that Grant actually makes a brief, but significant, return as Daniel in Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy, after sitting out the last chapter, Bridget Jones’s Baby.

The story picks up several years on, where a heartbroken Bridget – now a widow with two young kids, following the tragic death of her husband, Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) – is reluctantly facing the prospect of re-entering the dating world.

Leo Woodall plays Bridget’s much-younger boyfriend, Roxster, in Mad About The Boy.

While Bridget and Daniel’s dynamic has shifted dramatically from the beginning of the story until now, Zellweger and Grant’s on-screen chemistry is as magnetic as ever.

Given that the British actor recently revealed that there had initially been plans for Daniel to be one of the two potential fathers of Bridget’s baby in the third film (a role ultimately filled by newcomer Patrick Dempsey) – was there ever any chance of him ultimately winding up with Bridget?

“They’ve got that chemistry, they’ve got that spark,” Zellweger pointed out.

“I still see it. It’s lovely. [But] I love where their relationship has gone, it’s so unexpected … He’s the least likely person to sustain that [with Bridget].”

However, whether their endgame pairing had ever been seriously considered as an option, the actress said, was “a very good question for [Bridget Jones author] Helen [Fielding].”

“And when you get that answer – call me, please!” she laughed.

Grant, as Daniel returns in an unexpected capacity in the latest chapter.

The American actress was in her early 30s when she first became loveable Londoner Bridget Jones in 2001, and 24 years on, she still finds it “crazy” that the story has evolved into the juggernaut it is today.

“You wouldn’t have thought it in 2000 at all – we thought we were entering into something that represented a time, and that would be the end of it,” the 55-year-old explained.

But there was a “magic” to Bridget Jones that she hadn’t yet quite grasped back then.

“Revisiting her each time, she’s different – just like in life. That’s part of the magic of the characters Helen created … they feel so relatable because she’s sharing her experiences in real time through them,” Zellweger said.

“And as we go through life, we say, ‘oh yeah, I did that … oh yeah, that dumb thing. Yep, Bridget. Yep, I remember’.”

She added: “And we see ourselves in her imperfection and authenticity and her humanity.”

Zellweger said the popularity of the franchise has been “crazy” to experience. Picture: Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images

Millions all over the world may feel they’ve got a bit of Bridget in them – but none more so than her creator, Helen Fielding, who mined plenty of her own life experiences to pour into the quasi-autobiographical Bridget Jones books.

True to form, her first in-person meeting with Leo Woodall - the 29-year-old actor playing Bridget’s much-younger love interest, Roxster, in Mad About The Boy - could have been straight off the pages.

“We hugged, and my headset got stuck in Helen’s hair,” Zellweger explained to news.com.au, with Woodall jumping in: “I looked at it going, ‘Wow, a real Bridget moment. Bridget-squared.”

“[Fielding] was just coming to meet a couple of people for the first time - some of the lovely men on the set … and that’s not optimal to be like that,” Zellweger went on, in a fit of giggles.

As Woodall added: “I knew I’d come to the right place.”

Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy will be released in Australian cinemas on February 13.

Originally published as Renée Zellweger weighs in on big Bridget Jones rumour ahead of fourth film, Mad About The Boy