Will Colin Firth Be in 'Bridget Jones's Diary 4'? The Fourth Movie Gets a Release Date

Former singleton Bridget Jones is coming back! Two-time Oscar winner Renée Zellweger is set to reprise her beloved role in a fourth Bridget Jones movie. The Universal Pictures film, directed by Michael Morris, is an adaptation of Helen Fielding’s best-selling novel Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.

The Mail on Sunday reported in February of 2024 that a fourth film was set to begin filming in May. "[Zellweger] is excited about bringing Bridget back," a source told the outlet. "She adores the character so much. Bridget Jones fever is expected to sweep across London this spring." 

Zellweger had previously spoken about her desire to revisit the character. During an appearance on SiriusXM's The Jess Cagle Show in 2022, the actress said, "I love being in her shoes. I mean, it makes me giggle, you know, every day on set the choices that we get to make about just how awkward we can make her circumstances. It's just so much fun."

Zellweger also noted, "I think it's really rare to get to follow a character through different stages in her life. And in a way that, you know, we find her relatable because she parallels our own life experiences at that time. Yeah, I hope so. I mean, Helen did write another book, so there's that, you know. We'll see."

Meanwhile, Fielding, who created the rom-com heroine, has said that she wants to see an adaptation of her 2013 book, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.

"Yes I’m working on it and I really hope it will happen. Every film that gets made is a miracle—it’s really difficult to make films happen and to make them good," Fielding said on the Radio Times' View From My Sofa Podcast in 2022. "But I’d love to see it on the screen."

While rom-com fans await Bridget's return to the big screen, here is everything we know about the fourth Bridget Jones's Diary movie, from cast to plot to release date!

Related: Renee Zellweger Talks Depression: 'I Was the Last Thing on My List of Priorities'

When will Bridget Jones's Diary 4 be released?

The movie will debut in theaters internationally and on Peacock in the US on Valentine’s Day 2025.

Related: Laugh and Swoon With the 75 Best Romantic Comedies of All Time

What is Bridget Jones's Diary 4 called? 

The working title of the fourth Bridget Jones movie is Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.

Who is in the Bridget Jones's Diary 4 cast?

Renée Zellweger

Of course you can't have a Bridget Jones movie without Bridget Jones herself. Renée Zellweger will be reprising the titular role for a fourth time, nearly 25 years after the original. 

Hugh Grant

Hugh Grant will be returning to the franchise after his character, Daniel Cleaver, was largely absent from the third movie. Cleaver was presumed dead after a plane crash, but it was revealed in the final moments of Bridget Jones's Baby that he is in fact alive. How will this shake things up for Bridget? We shall see. 

Emma Thompson

Thompson, who joined the franchise as Jones' OB/GYN, Dr. Rawling in Bridget Jones's Baby, will be returning for Mad About the Boy. In addition to acting in both movies, she was also a screenwriter on both the third and fourth installments of the franchise. 

Chiwetel Ejiofor

For what continues to be a Love Actually reunion, Chiwetel Ejiofor is joining the franchise. The Emmy, Oscar and Golden Globe-nominated actor has appeared in 12 Years a Slave, The Martian, The Lion King and Kinky Boots. 

Leo Woodall

Leo Woodall has also joined the cast in an undisclosed role. He's most well known for appearing in Season 2 of The White Lotus and more recently One Day. 

What will happen in Bridget Jones's Diary 4?

The third installment, Bridget Jones's Baby, saw Zellweger's character finally marry her longtime love interest, Mark Darcy, who ended up being the father of her son, William. The fourth movie's script is adapted from Fielding’s novel Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, which killed off Mark, leaving Bridget a widowed mother of two.

A description for Bridget Jones: Mad About The Boy, via Penguin Random House, reads: "Fourteen years after landing Mark Darcy, Bridget’s life has taken her places she never expected. But despite the new challenges of single parenting, online dating, wildly morphing dress sizes, and bafflingly complex remote controls, she is the same irrepressible and endearing soul we all remember—though her talent for embarrassing herself in hilarious ways has become dangerously amplified now that she has 752 Twitter followers. As Bridget navigates head lice epidemics, school-picnic humiliations, and cross-generational sex, she learns that life isn’t over when you start needing reading glasses—and why one should never, ever text while drunk."

Discussing the book with TODAY’s Jenna Bush Hager in 2013, Fielding said, "With something like ‘Bridget,’ which is an unexpected success, you have a choice. Either you keep carrying on, doing the same thing—over and over again—or it means something really important to you, and you wait until you’re ready and you have something important to say again.”

Will Colin Firth be in Bridget Jones's Diary 4?

No word yet on whether Colin Firth will return for the fourth film...after all, his character Mark Darcy gets killed off in the book Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy. 

Next, 25 Rom-Com Heroines Who Totally Rock, From Juno to Amélie and More