As proposals go, it was no Oscar winner – certainly not what one might expect from a revered writer of romantic comedies.

So when Richard Curtis, the man who brought us Four Weddings and a Funeral, Love Actually,and Notting Hill, vaguely hinted in a radio interview that he might have plans to tie the knot, it was perhaps not surprising that it met with a less than enthusiastic response from his long term partner Emma Freud.

The 52-year-old broadcaster, who shares a home in Walberswick with Mr Curtis, took to Twitter with her disapproval.

“Whaaat? First I’ve heard about it. Is this what you call a proposal?” Tweeted Emma Freud, using the hashtag #notsoromanticafterall.

Ms Freud, who has four children by Mr Curtis, went on to say: “Just for the record I am not getting married. He would have to ask me in person. Or at least on Twitter.”

The “worst ever marriage proposal”, as described by Ms Freud, was aired on Radio 4’s The Reunion, when Mr Curtis told the show’s host Sue MacGregor that he wrote Four Weddings and a Funeral “as an attempt to explain to my mother why I wasn’t getting married.”

“I have to say it didn’t work,” he said. “She was still very unhappy with the situation for the next 15 years, although do you know I’m thinking about it. I think I might.”

In the film, Charles, played by Hugh Grant, makes an offer of life-long commitment without marriage to Andie MacDowell’s Carrie, by saying: “Do you think not being married to me might maybe be something you could consider doing for the rest of your life?”

To which Carrie, unlike Ms Freud, replied “I do.”

Real life, it would seem, is not quite like the movies.