28 Sep 1934 - 28 Dec 2025 (91 years)

Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot, often referred to by her initials B.B., was a French actress, singer, model and animal rights activist. Famous for portraying characters with hedonistic lives, she was one of the best-known symbols of the sexual revolution. Although she withdrew from the entertainment industry in 1973, she remained a major pop culture icon. She acted in 47 films, performed in several musicals, and recorded more than 60 songs. She was awarded the Legion of Honour in 1985.

Born and raised in Paris, Bardot was an aspiring ballerina during her childhood. She started her acting career in 1952 and achieved international recognition in 1957 for her role in And God Created Woman (1956), catching the attention of many French intellectuals and earning her the nickname "sex kitten". She was the subject of philosopher Simone de Beauvoir's 1959 essay The Lolita Syndrome, which described her as a "locomotive of women's history" and built upon existentialist themes to declare her the most liberated woman of France. She won a 1961 David di Donatello Best Foreign Actress Award for her work in The Truth (1960). Bardot later starred in Jean-Luc Godard's film Le Mépris (1963). For her role in Louis Malle's film Viva Maria! (1965), she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress. French President Charles de Gaulle called Bardot "the French export as important as Renault cars".

After retiring from acting in 1973, Bardot became an animal rights activist and created the Brigitte Bardot Foundation. She was known for her strong personality, outspokenness, and speeches on animal defense; she was fined twice for public insults. She was also fined six times for inciting racial hatred for her comments on Muslims in France and calling residents of Réunion "savages". She responded: “I never knowingly wanted to hurt anybody. It is not in my character (…) Among Muslims, I think there are some who are very good and some hoodlums, like everywhere.”

Bardot was a member of the Global 500 Roll of Honour of the United Nations Environment Programme and received several awards and accolades from UNESCO and PETA.

Bardot was married four times, with her last marriage lasting far longer than the previous three combined. By her own count, she had a total of 17 romantic relationships. Bardot would characteristically leave for another relationship when "the present was getting lukewarm"; she said, "I have always looked for passion. That's why I was often unfaithful. And when the passion was coming to an end, I was packing my suitcase."

Bardot became pregnant before she and Charrier married. Bardot was extremely dismayed—she had previously stated "I am not a mother, nor do I want to be one" — and sought an abortion; however, abortion was illegal at that time in France. In her book Initiales B. B: Mémoires, she recalled: "I looked at my flat, slender belly in the mirror like a dear friend upon whom I was about to close a coffin lid." Numerous times, she punched herself in the stomach and asked her doctor for morphine in an attempt to abort the baby.

During the final months of pregnancy, photographers surrounded her house, vying for photos of Bardot pregnant. Nicolas-Jacques Charrier was born on 11 January 1960, seven months after their wedding. He would be Bardot's only child. She had been so wary of the press she decided to give birth at home. Following his birth, Bardot became depressed and attempted suicide.

She later wrote that her son was a "cancerous tumor" and that she would have "preferred to give birth to a little dog". She also added, "I'm not made to be a mother. I'm not adult enough — I know it's horrible to have to admit that, but I'm not adult enough to take care of a child." She refused to breastfeed Nicolas and whenever she held him, he sensed her agitation and began to cry.

After she and Charrier divorced, the latter gained sole custody of Nicolas. When Nicolas was 12, he asked Bardot if he could stay with her, but she turned him away in favor of party guests. Nicolas was hurt and did not speak to her afterwards. In her memoirs, Bardot wrote that she loved Nicolas "the most in the world", but Nicolas wanted nothing to do with her. When he married Norwegian model Anne-Line Bjerkan in 1984, Bardot was not invited to the wedding.

Bardot became a grandmother when the two had daughters in 1985 and 1990. She tried to make peace with him on multiple occasions, but to no avail. In 1997, Charrier and Nicolas sued her and her publisher, Grasset, for the hurtful remarks she had made in her memoir. She was ordered to pay Charrier £17,000 and Nicolas £11,000. In 2018, she stated that she and Nicolas, now a grandfather himself, were on good terms, speaking regularly and visiting each other once a year.

Bardot died in Toulon at the age of 91, following an illness and surgery two months earlier. No cause of death was specified in the announcement by the Brigitte Bardot Foundation.