@hopefulhalf
That quirky corner flat must have been worth approaching a million
Actually not in 1994 when the column was started . It's in London Bridge/ borough which was considered pretty grotty in 1988 when Bridget might have bought.
I think there was an article highlighting this in the Indie, that Bridget Jones thought she had it bad whereas now millennials can’t get on the housing ladder and that flat would be unattainable. (It was full of YABU for writing for indie and having audacity to complain comments beneath, oh and YABU to talk about Bridget as a real person. May as well have been on mumsnet!)
Anyhow, YABU O, as the point of Bridget Jones was she’s a mickey take of a typical woman in that time. Obsessed with weight needlessly, drinking and smoking, in 30s but not married with close group of bonkers friends, making the same resolutions yearly whilst not really wanting to stick to them (bar when she goes to an event and wishes she was 10lbs lighter) and never managing to stick to them. It highlighted a more chaotic family than the nuclear mum, dad and 2.5 kids with Bridget's child being fathered by one man with the other looking to adopt them, this chaotic description of family was something in the media a lot at the time. Partly because women no longer had babies whisked off to be adopted out if wedlock and were no longer ostracised by society for daring to bring up a child without a man. The first novel/film was a modernisation of P&P so insulting her was necessary as it occurs in P&P when Darcy says, “she’s not handsome enough to tempt me”. That kind of allusion is common in literature - and film actually. She’s a wry chuckle of recognition, not a beacon to aspire to - hence awful colleagues like perpetua and characters like Magda with her ‘ defecational prodigy‘ son and jokes about rich Rebecca and her friends dressed like mad hippies.
Anyway, I know Renée Zellweger was made to gain weight for the film, but I thought it was only to normal BMI as Bridget BMI wasn’t supposed to be below 18 (which Zellweger was prior to Bridget). There was a big hoohah about her being portrayed as chubby at the time, but her BMI was completely normal, it was 23-25 at various points in filming as far as I remember. Yeah, she was 30lbs heavier than before, but she was at BMI 17.5 before which meets the criteria for Anorexia Nervosa. Hollywood’s always been rubbish about weight, their actresses are made to maintain far too thin a figure. Down to my own ED at the time, I was pretty obsessed about all this crap, so unfortunately I remember.
To put it in perspective, despite the media claiming it was 3 stone it was 30lbs, which is 2st2lbs. You could be 10stone2lbs with a bmi of 23.6 (healthy) and be just in the lowest side of healthy at a 2st2lb loss coming in at 8stone with a bmi of 18.6. However, the media wanted everyone to see her as ‘fat’ after the weight gain, so that was the story they told despite it not being accurate. The methods to gain and to lose were unhealthy, but given the timescale and the fact films were involved, that’s unsurprising.
Sorry for Daily Fail but it was blooming years ago and is now the only source I can find to back up what I’m saying. This was after but was her returning to her pre Bridget weight, not losing beyond what she had been at before. www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-41011/Does-Bridget-Jones-look-better-fat-thin.html