Well-wishers lined the streets of Brigitte Bardot’s hometown of Saint-Tropez on Wednesday for the funeral of the French screen icon as her husband revealed she had died from cancer.
Her wicker coffin was welcomed on the steps of the Notre-Dame de l’Assomption church by her long-estranged son at the start of a traditional Catholic funeral service in the morning.
The reclusive star of the 50s and 60s is set to be buried at her family’s Mediterranean seaside grave later in the day after she died aged 91 at her home on 28 December.
Hundreds of people watched proceedings on a giant screen erected on the yacht-filled port of Saint-Tropez which the star of “And God created Woman” helped transform into a glitzy playground for the rich.
“What I remember most is what she did for animals. She had a real sensitivity, a small streak of racism too, but it wasn’t malicious, she wasn’t just that,” Sandrine, a school assistant who had travelled several hours to Saint-Tropez, told the AFP news agency.
The 60-year-old from the Pyrenees mountains said she expected the public turn-out to be higher, suggesting it was because of criticism and media coverage of her political views and convictions for inciting racial hatred.
Bardot’s best-known associations, to the heyday of the New Wave French film industry, animal rights campaigning and far-right politics, were all represented at Friday’s televised church service.
The son of fellow late film star Jean-Paul Belmondo attended, as did far-right figurehead Marine Le Pen, and a host of animal rights campaigners whose work Bardot helped publicise through her own foundation.
Invitees filed past a photo of Bardot with one of her dogs, while a well-known image of her cuddling a baby seal was placed near the pulpit where elaborate flower wreaths were piled high.
Cancer battle
On the eve of the commemorations, Bardot’s fourth husband, former far-fight political advisor Bernard d’Ormale, revealed the cause of her death.
Bardot had undergone two operations for an unspecified cancer before the disease “took her,” d’Ormale told Paris Match magazine in an interview about their life together.
After being hospitalised twice in late 2025, Bardot insisted she wanted to return home to her villa known as “la Madrague”, despite being in physical discomfort.
“It was uncomfortable, even when she was bedridden,” added d’Ormale. “However, she remained conscious and concerned about the fate of animals until the very end.”
A divisive figure
The lack of a state commemoration for Bardot, one of the country’s best-known celebrities, as well as the mixed reaction to her death reflect her divisive character and much-debated legacy.
Most observers agree that she was a cinema legend who came to embody the sexual revolution of the 1960s through her acting and daring, unconventional persona.
But after she was convicted five times for racist hate speech particularly about Muslims, left-wing figures have offered only muted tributes and sometimes none at all.
Macron’s office offered to organise a national homage similar to one staged for fellow New Wave hero Belmondo in 2021, but the president was snubbed by Bardot’s family.
He did not attend on Wednesday but sent a wreath.
Bardot will be buried at a seaside cemetery in Saint-Tropez alongside her parents and grandparents.
In 2018, she said she wished to be buried in the garden of her home along with her pets to avoid a “crowd of idiots” trampling on the tombs of her ancestors.
