Brigitte Bardot, icon of 1960s French cinema and animal rights activist, dies at 91

Brigitte Bardot, the French sex symbol of the 1960s who became one of the biggest screen sirens of the 20th century and later a militant animal rights activist and far-right supporter, has died, according to her foundation. She was 91 years old.

“The Brigitte Bardot Foundation announces with immense sadness the passing of its founder and president, Brigitte Bardot, the world-renowned actress and singer, who decided to abandon her prestigious career to dedicate her life and energy to animal welfare and her Foundation,” the foundation said in a statement to News themezone.

Bruno Jacquelin of the foundation told the News that the late actress died Sunday in southern France. He gave no cause of death and said no arrangements have yet been made for a funeral or memorial services. She had been hospitalized last month.

Bardot became an international celebrity as a sexualized teenage bride in the 1956 film “And God Created Woman.” Directed by her then-husband, Roger Vadim, it sparked a scandal with scenes of the leggy beauty dancing naked on tables.

At the height of a film career that spanned some 28 films and three marriages, Bardot came to symbolize a nation brimming with bourgeois respectability. Her tousled blonde hair, voluptuous figure, and irreverent pout made her one of France’s best-known stars.

Her attractiveness was such that in 1969 her features were chosen as the model for “Marianne”, the national emblem of France and the official French seal. Bardot’s face appeared on statues, postage stamps and even coins.

“We are mourning a legend,” French President Emmanuel Macron wrote on social media on Sunday.

Bardot’s second career as an animal rights activist was equally sensational. He traveled to the Arctic to denounce the killing of seal pups; condemned the use of animals in laboratory experiments; and opposed Muslim slaughter rituals.

“Man is an insatiable predator,” Bardot told The News on her 73rd birthday in 2007. “I don’t care about my past glory. That means nothing in the face of a suffering animal, since it has no power, no words to defend itself.”

His activism earned the respect of his compatriots and, in 1985, he received the Legion of Honor, the country’s highest recognition.

A turn to the extreme right

Later, however, he fell into disgrace when his tirades about animal protection took on a decidedly extremist tone. He frequently denounced the influx of immigrants to France, especially Muslims.

She was convicted and fined five times in French courts for inciting racial hatred, in incidents inspired by her opposition to the Muslim practice of slaughtering sheep during annual religious festivals.

Bardot’s marriage in 1992 to her fourth husband, Bernard d’Ormale, a former adviser to the leader of the National Front. Jean-Marie Le Pencontributed to his political change. He described Le Pen, an avowed nationalist with multiple racist convictions, as a “charming and intelligent man.”

In 2012, he wrote a letter supporting the presidential candidacy of Marine Le Pen, who now leads his father’s party, the Renowned National Rally. Le Pen paid tribute on Sunday to an “exceptional woman” who was “incredibly French.”

In 2018, at the height of the #MeToo movement, Bardot said in an interview that most actors protesting sexual harassment in the film industry were “hypocritical” and “ridiculous” because many mocked producers to get roles.

She said she had never been a victim of sexual harassment and found it “lovely to be told I was beautiful or that I had a nice butt.”

A privileged, but “difficult” education

Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot was born on September 28, 1934, the daughter of a wealthy industrialist. A shy and reserved girl, she studied classical ballet and was discovered by a family friend who put her on the cover of Elle magazine at age 14.

Bardot once described her childhood as “difficult” and said her father was a strict disciplinarian who sometimes punished her with a horse whip.

But it was the French film producer Vadim, whom she married in 1952, who saw her potential and wrote “And God Created Woman” to showcase her provocative sensuality, an explosive cocktail of childlike innocence and raw sexuality.

The film, which portrayed Bardot as a bored newlywed who sleeps with her brother-in-law, had a decisive influence on New Wave directors Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut, and came to embody the hedonism and sexual freedom of the 1960s.

The film was a box office success and made Bardot a superstar. Her girlish pout, tiny waist and generous bust were often more appreciated than her talent.

“It’s a shame to have acted so badly,” Bardot said of her early films. “I suffered a lot at first. They really treated me like someone less than nothing.”

Bardot’s cheeky off-screen love affair with co-star Jean-Louis Trintignant further shocked the nation. It eradicated the boundaries between her public and private life and made her a hot prize for the paparazzi.

Bardot never adapted to the spotlight. He blamed constant press attention for the suicide attempt that occurred 10 months after the birth of his only son, Nicolas. Photographers had broken into her house two weeks before she gave birth to take a photo of her pregnancy.

Nicolas’s father was Jacques Charrier, a French actor whom she married in 1959 but who never felt comfortable in his role as Monsieur Bardot. Bardot soon handed her son over to his father and later said that she had been chronically depressed and unprepared for the duties of being a mother.

“So I was looking for roots,” he said in an interview. “I had nothing to offer.”

In her 1996 autobiography, “Initials BB,” she compared her pregnancy to “a tumor growing inside me” and described Charrier as “temperamental and abusive.”

Bardot married her third husband, West German millionaire playboy Gunther Sachs, in 1966, but the relationship again ended in divorce three years later.

Among his films are “A Parisian” (1957); “In Case of Misfortune,” in which he starred in 1958 alongside film legend Jean Gabin; “The Truth” (1960); “Private life” (1962); “A Dazzling Idiot” (1964); “Shalako” (1968); “Women” (1969); “The Bear and the Doll” (1970); “Rum Boulevard” (1971); and “Don Juan” (1973).

With the exception of 1963’s critically acclaimed “Contempt,” directed by Godard, Bardot’s films were rarely complicated by plots. They were often vehicles for showing Bardot in skimpy dresses or frolicking naked in the sun.

“It was never a big passion for me,” he said of cinema. “And sometimes it can be deadly. Marilyn (Monroe) died from it.”

Bardot retired to her Riviera villa in St. Tropez at the age of 39 in 1973 after “The Woman Grabber.”

Reinvent yourself in middle age

She emerged a decade later with a new persona: an animal rights lobbyist, her face wrinkled and her voice deep from years of heavy smoking. She abandoned her jet-set life and sold jewelry and movie memorabilia to create a foundation dedicated exclusively to the prevention of animal cruelty.

His activism knew no borders. He urged South Korea to ban the sale of dog meat and once wrote to then-President Bill Clinton asking why the US Navy recaptured two dolphins he had released into the wild.

He attacked centuries-old French and Italian sporting traditions, including the Palio, a free-for-all horse race, and campaigned on behalf of wolves, rabbits, kittens and turtledoves.

“It’s true that sometimes I get carried away, but when I see how things move slowly… my anguish takes over,” Bardot told the AP when asked about her beliefs of racial hatred and her opposition to Muslim ritual killings.

In 1997, several cities removed Bardot-inspired statues of Marianne after the actress expressed anti-immigrant sentiments. Also that year he received death threats after calling for a ban on the sale of horse meat.

Bardot once said that she identified with the animals she was trying to save.

“I can understand the hunted animals because of the way they treated me,” Bardot said. “What happened to me was inhumane. I was constantly surrounded by the world’s press.”