Helen Fielding: I told Colin Firth on the phone Mark Darcy had been killed off

At least Hugh Grant can rest easy

Helen Fielding signs copies of her latest Bridget Jones novel at Foyles in central London (PA)

Bridget is back and Renée Zellweger (below) is probably already scoffing cronuts in preparation for an inevitable third big screen outing. But what of poor Colin Firth, whose character Mark Darcy is killed off in Mad About the Boy, Helen Fielding’s third Bridget Jones novel?

Fielding had to find a way to break the news to the actor that there would be no part for him in any future film. “I did want to tell Colin in person but we were trying to have lunch, and I couldn’t really tell him why I was trying to meet him and he was in a different place,” Fielding tells Time magazine. “So I ended up telling him he died on the phone. I had to ask him if he had someone with him and if he was sitting down. It was like someone actually had died. We had to process it. And I was almost saying, ‘I’m so sorry for your loss’.”

At least Hugh Grant can rest easy – his caddish Daniel is still very much on the scene in book three.

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