How Richard Curtis' feminist daughter Scarlett branded her great-great grandfather Sigmund Freud 'sexist and horrible' and called out her father for 'size jokes' after scoring a cameo in his hit rom-com Love Actually
- Scarlett Curtis, 28, created a successful career as a feminist activist writer
Richard Curtis revealed this week how his daughter had convinced him that he was 'stupid and wrong' for how he joked about people's sizes in his films.
The Four Weddings and a Funeral and Blackadder writer told an audience at the Cheltenham Literature Festival how he has now promised 28-year-old Scarlett, who was interviewing him, that he will never make 'fat' jokes again.
But it is not the first time that feminist writer Scarlett has hit the headlines, having previously called her great-great grandfather Sigmund Freud 'sexist and horrible' and saying she comes from a 'long line of dodgy men'.
The 28-year-old, whose mother is the broadcaster Emma Freud, also once made a cameo appearance in her father's hit rom com Love Actually.
During her conversation with the filmmaker this weekend, she got him to say that he regrets much of his work and to promise never to use the words 'fat' and 'chubby' again.
In the 2001 adaptation of Bridget Jones's Diary – which Curtis wrote the screenplay for - Renée Zellweger's character was described as having 'tree-trunk thighs'.
Writer Scarlett Curtis was always likely to have artistic genes with many famous figures in her family
Scarlett (right) had a cameo in her father's beloved Christmas hit Love Actually
Four Weddings and a Funeral writer Richard Curtis says his daughter Scarlett Curtis (right) had made him see that his jokes about women and people's size in his films weren't funny anymore
And in Love Actually, which Curtis directed and wrote, Martine McCutcheon’s character Natalie – the PA to the Prime Minister - was famously depicted as the 'chubby one' and having a 'sizeable a**e'.
Curtis admitted that, two decades on, these jokes are no longer funny.
According to The Times, he told the audience: 'I remember how shocked I was five years ago when Scarlett said to me, "You can never use the word 'fat' again",' he said.
'Wow, you were right. In my generation calling someone chubby [was funny] — in there were jokes about that. Those jokes aren't any longer funny.'
Scarlett is not the only child of Curtis to ever take to the stage, as her brother Spike Curtis was last year revealed to be the ‘random’ fan plucked from the crowd to perform with Dave at Coachella.
The son of the Love Actually writer amazed the audience at the California festival with his rap skills when he got up on stage to sing Thiago Silva with the British rapper.
Scarlett this year made her TV writing debut on the second series of Amazon Prime Video's teen romance The Summer I Turned Pretty
Scarlett is not the only child of Curtis to ever take to the stage, as her brother Spike Curtis was last year revealed to be the random fan plucked from the crowd to perform with Dave at Coachella (above)
Renée Zellweger - pictured as Bridget Jones in 2001 - is described as having 'tree-trunk' thighs
Zellweger (pictured in the Bridget Jones's Diary) told British Vogue in 2016 how she never understood the fascination with the character's weight saying she is perfectly normal
Scarlett described her great-great grandfather Sigmund Freud (pictured) as 'sexist' and 'horrible'
Their maternal grandfather Clement Freud - a broadcaster, MP and chef - was exposed as a child molester in 2016, seven years after his death.
Speaking in an interview with the Daily Telegraph in 2019, Scarlett said: 'There's a long line of very dodgy men in my family.
'That's why I'm such a feminist, trying to redress the sins of the fathers.'
Scarlett told how the family avoided speaking about Freud growing up.
She said: 'My Grandpa [Clement] had a really complicated relationship and we were banned from mentioning Sigmund because he was so obsessed with making it on his own.
'Mum wasn't interested. I actively skirted him as a child.'
Curtis has previously admitted that his children did not like his jokes and said his films were starting to look like 'historical documents'.
Speaking to Craig Oliver on his Desperately Seeking Wisdom podcast in January last year, The Blackadder and Mr Bean creator said: 'All my conversations with my children now, they don't like 20 percent of my jokes, because they think they're old fashioned and wrong in some way.
'So I'm really interested in how a generation that's grown up to be passionate, angry and pedantic about these issues may well change things for the better.'
Curtis previously admitted that 2003 Christmas classic Love Actually's lack of diversity now makes him feel 'uncomfortable' and 'a bit stupid'
The Prime Minister's PA Natalie in Love Actually, played by Martine McCutcheon, was famously depicted as the 'chubby one' and having a 'sizeable arse'
But he did defend himself for having a gay couple in 1994 film Four Weddings and a Funeral (Pictured: Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell)
In a separate interview, he admitted that Love Actually's lack of diversity now makes him feel 'uncomfortable' and 'a bit stupid' as he looked back for the film's 20th anniversary.
Speaking to host Diane Sawyer for the ABC special The Laughter and Secrets of Love Actually: 20 Years Later, he admitted he thinks the 2003 Christmas classic is 'out of date' in some moments.
'There are things you'd change, but thank god, society is, you know, changing. So, my film is bound, in some moments, to feel, you know, out of date,' he said.
'I mean, there are things about the film, you know, the lack of diversity makes me feel uncomfortable and a bit stupid.'
Curtis and his wife have been together for 33 years. As well as Scarlett and Spike, they have two other children, sons Jake and Charlie.
Scarlett even created the artwork for Ed Sheeran's seventh album Autumn Variations
