What To Know About Her 4 Marriages Hollywood Life

August 2024 · 5 minute read

Pop culture icon and 1960s sex symbol Brigitte Bardot, 88, had a spectacular career as an actress, model, and singer. Appearing in landmark films including And God Created Woman (1956) and Le Mépris (1963) and ultimately being nominated for a BAFTA Award, she eventually grew weary of public life and retired from the entertainment industry in 1973. And aside from the career in front of the camera, the famed animal rights activist also had several relationships in private, though she admitted she lacked commitment. “I have always looked for passion,” she once said. “That’s why I was often unfaithful. And when the passion was coming to an end, I was packing my suitcase.”

Throughout her life, Brigitte has been married three times, with marrying her fourth and current husband Bernard d’Ormale in 1992. Bernard revealed that the actress had been hospitalized for “trouble breathing” on July 19, 2023. He revealed the heat and got to her while speaking to French outlet Varmatin. “[Her breathing] was stronger than usual but she did not lose consciousness. Let’s call it a moment of respiratory distraction,” he said. Find out everything you need to know about Bernard and Brigitte’s prior husbands here!

Roger Vadim

Brigitte was only 18 years old when she married director Roger Vadim, 24 at the time, on December 20, 1952. Her husband would go on to direct her in the role that gained her worldwide recognition — Juliette in And God Created Woman. But by 1956, the relationship seemed to be in trouble, as the breathtaking beauty fell in love with her married costar Jean-Louis Trintignant. Her marriage to Roger was over by 1957.

Despite the split, the former couple appeared to remain on good terms. The pair reunited for 1961’s Please, Not Now! and 1962’s Love On A Pillow. He even complimented her And God Created Woman performance of one of the most memorable scenes of her dancing barefoot in a 1988 Associated Press interview. “There was really nothing shocking in what Brigitte did, what was provocative was her natural sensuality,” he said, per The Guardian. 

Roger was married four times after Brigitte, including to Jane Fonda, 85, from 1965 to 1973. His fifth and final marriage was to actress Marie-Christine Barrault from 1990 until his death in 2000. He was 72 when he passed away.

Jacques Charrier

After breaking up with Jean-Louis, Brigitte embarked on a relationship with French actor, film producer, and artist Jacques Charrier. Brigitte became pregnant with him, and they were subsequently married on married on June 18, 1959. The duo welcomed Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, Brigitte’s only child, on January 11, 1960. She reportedly engaged in an affair with Glenn Ford in the early 1960s, and ultimately divorced Jacques in 1962.

Aside from the reported affair, Brigitte revealed that she wasn’t happy when she became pregnant in her memoir Initials BB, per The Sydney Morning Herald. After she and Jacques split in 1962, he raised Nicolas with little contact with his mother, and both her ex and son tried to sue her for damages after her memoir was published. Brigitte was reportedly not invited to her son’s wedding in 1982. They do seem to have reconciled since then.

Gunter Sachs

After a two-year stint living with musician Bob Zagury, Brigitte fell for German millionaire Gunter Sachs. She married the famed playboy in Las Vegas on July 14, 1966, but again, the union only lasted a couple of years and ended in divorce on October 7, 1969. He had, however, been quite a romantic; Gunter was known for having a helicopter drop a cascade of red roses over La Madrague, Brigitte’s property on the Côte d’Azur. “It’s not every day a man drops a ton of roses in your backyard,” she wrote of the grand gesture in her autobiography Initiales BB, per The Independent.

And that wasn’t the last of it, either. After Brigitte sold her lavish wedding ring following their split, Gunter reportedly tracked it down and returned it to an undoubtedly stunned Brigitte. “I’d already known and loved many men, I’d had passionate affairs,” she wrote in her book of her initial meeting with Gunter. “But that evening, I was hypnotised. I seemed to be flying, as if carried by Gunter into a fairytale world I had never known and would never know again.”

Gunter later died by suicide at the age of 78 in 2011, per The Daily Mail.

Bernard D’Ormale

Brigitte entered into several relationships in the years following her split from Gunter, but eventually remarried to businessman and right-wing politician Bernard D’Ormale in 1992 at the age of 58.  It was reportedly an intimate ceremony. The couple’s wedding was reportedly at an intimate ceremony in “a little wood chapel” in Norway, according to The New York Times. “Two weeks after we met Brigitte phoned Nicolas [her son] because she wanted him to meet me, and we agreed to go and see him in Norway,” Bernard said at the time, per PEOPLE. “Just before we left, she said, ‘Why don’t we get married while we are there?’ So we did. But quietly. I am not a man for the limelight. Only close friends of ours knew.”

The duo remain married to this day.

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