The Brigitte Bardot Foundation announced on Sunday, Dec. 28, that the French actress and model has died at age 91.<\/p>\n
Bardot was last seen publicly in 2024, when she was photographed in her car in Saint-Tropez, France, on Sept. 28 \u2014 her 90th birthday.<\/p>\n
Prior to that, Bardot, who was born Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot in Paris in 1934, was seen in public posing with a dog in France in July 2023.<\/p>\n
Never miss a story \u2014 sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter<\/a> to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer\u200b\u200b, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.<\/p>\n APS-Medias\/ABACA\/Shutterstock <\/p>\n Brigitte Bardot posing with a dog in France in July 2023.<\/p>\n In its statement announcing Bardot’s death to the French news agency AFP, The Brigitte Bardot Foundation didn’t specify the time or place of her death.<\/p>\n Bardot’s death comes after reports surfaced in October that she had undergone surgery<\/a> amid\u00a0a “serious illness.”<\/p>\n The PEOPLE Puzzler crossword is here! How quickly can you solve it? Play now!<\/a><\/p>\n The star began her career as a model, appearing on the cover of\u00a0Elle\u00a0at the age of 15 in 1950, and she later rose to international fame after her role in the controversial 1956 film\u00a0And God Created Woman.<\/p>\n Bardot retired from acting in 1973 at the age of 39 and ventured into a new career path: animal rights activism. (She launched the Brigitte Bardot Foundation for the Welfare and Protection of Animals in 1986.)<\/p>\n Hulton Archive\/Getty<\/p>\n Brigitte Bardot in the 1960s.<\/p>\n Over the years, Bardot faced multiple health setbacks, including a suicide attempt<\/a> and a breast cancer diagnosis.<\/p>\n She also surrounded herself in controversy throughout her life, being fined multiple times by the French government for inciting racial hatred<\/a> and making headlines when she called the #MeToo movement<\/a> \u201chypocritical, ridiculous and uninteresting,” among other instances.<\/p>\n Bardot wed four times throughout her life<\/a>. She was married to Roger Vadim from 1952 to 1957, to Jacques Charrier from 1959 to 1962, to Gunter Sachs from 1966 to 1969, and she was married to Bernard d’Ormale since 2002.<\/p>\n She and Charrier welcomed a son, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier<\/a>, in Paris on Jan. 11, 1960. Bardot spoke openly about her distaste for being a mom, including in her memoir Initiales B.B., in which she wrote, “I’m not made to be a mother.”<\/p>\n![\"APS-Medias\/ABACA\/Shutterstock\u00a0](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/34e48b707a7946ec9e3156a5873dd122.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n![\"\u00a0Hulton](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/379d9ac400cfbe01539e8eb41ab78334.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n