TOULOUSE — Legendary French actress Brigitte Bardot died at 91, according to a statement from her foundation provided to CNN on Sunday.

She had been in hospital in the southern French city of Toulon since November.

The Brigitte Bardot Foundation announced her death with "immense sadness", describing her as a "world-renowned actress and singer, who chose to abandon her prestigious career to dedicate her life and energy to animal welfare and her foundation."

“The Brigitte Bardot Foundation pays tribute to the memory of an exceptional woman who gave everything and gave up everything for a world more respectful of animals,” the foundation said. “Her legacy lives on through the actions and struggles the foundation continues with the same passion and the same fidelity to her ideals.”

Known for her enormous impact on the silver screen, and beyond it, "BB" as she was widely called in France, was an essential ingredient in French culture and soon became an icon after her first role in Le Trou Normand (1952).

Bardot tantalized audiences and scandalized moral authorities with her raw display of sexuality in the 1950s and ‘60s. She became a box-office phenomenon in the United States and helped to popularize foreign films with Americans at a time when censorship in Hollywood movies forbade explicit discussions of sex.

French President Emmanuel Macron paid tribute to Bardot, saying she “embodied a life of freedom.”

“Her films, her voice, her dazzling glory, her initials, her sorrows, her generous passion for animals, her face that became Marianne (the symbol of the French republic), Brigitte Bardot embodied a life of freedom,” Macron posted on X.

“We mourn a legend of the century,” he added.

She divided public opinion as one of the first truly modern celebrities. Long before Madonna, Bardot pursued several love affairs with men on her own terms and was unapologetic about her hedonistic behavior and lifestyle in a pre-feminist era.

The star dismissed her own acting abilities and rarely won critics’ praise, but her charismatic personality was undeniable for nearly two decades in 40-plus films such as “…And God Created Woman” (1956), “Contempt” (1963) and “Viva Maria!” (1965). She also became a popular singer in France in the ‘60s.

Bardot will also leave an indelible trace in French minds through her music. Her debut album, Brigitte Bardot Sings (1963) featured French-language songs, reflecting her public persona and showcasing her singing style.

In the late 60s she had a romantic affair with the legendary French singer-songwriter Serge Gainsbourg and was the voice on numerous hits including, Bonnie and Clyde, Harley Davidson, La Madrague and Comic Strip.

In 1967, the pair also recorded the famous duet Je t'aime...moi non plus which caused enormous controversy as it featured sexually explicit lyrics and simulated sounds of lovemaking. The track was never officially released given Bardot's then husband Gunter Sach's links to the Catholic Church, but it gained notoriety after being leaked. Further scandal and gossip erupted about whom Gainsbourg wrote the song for after it was later rerecorded by him and Jane Birkin in 1969.

After retiring from movies at age 39 in 1973, Bardot used her celebrity to bring attention to the plight of animals.

“I gave my beauty and my youth to men, and now I am giving my wisdom and experience, the best of me, to animals,” she told a crowd at a 1987 auction of her memorabilia to raise funds for the Brigitte Bardot Foundation for animal welfare.

But she remained a controversial figure, facing criticism for expressing anti-immigrant attitudes when she denounced Islamic rituals involving the slaughter of animals. Her 1992 marriage to Bernard d’Ormale, an associate of far-right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen, cemented the idea that she was out of touch with a modern and diverse France. She was convicted for inciting racial hatred multiple times, including by insulting the Muslim community, according to Reuters news agency.

In a tribute to the movie star, far-right figurehead Marine Le Pen, Jean-Marie’s daughter, said Bardot was an “exceptional woman” who will be “greatly missed by us.” Meanwhile, Jordan Bardella, leader of France’s far-right National Rally party, called the actress a “woman of heart, conviction and character.”

After threatening for years to retire, Bardot finally called it quits in the early ‘70s. Making movies never seemed to satisfy her.

“All of this – most of this – bores me,” she told The Saturday Evening Post as early as 1965. “I try to be my best, to be always prepared, but I am not an actress. Lady Macbeth does not interest me. I am just Brigitte Bardot. In the movies or out, I do not think I will ever be anything else.”

However, she didn’t disappear from the spotlight completely, instead focusing her energy on helping animals. Her campaign to protect baby seals from hunters in Canada attracted much press attention in the late ‘70s, with images of the star holding a seal cub. But it also exposed her to ridicule.

“When I gave up movies, some people said I was protecting animals to gain publicity,” she told The New York Times in 1994. “Now, if there was one woman in the world who didn’t need publicity, who always had too much publicity, it was me. Even today, there are people who ask, why don’t you help children, or the people in Bosnia, or old people, or AIDS victims? There are always people telling me I should worry about something else.”

She would sell off many of her personal effects to raise money for her foundation, including a diamond ring from third husband Gunter Sachs, and sign over the ownership to La Madrague, her longtime beachfront home in St. Tropez.

Just as she made her own rules as a film star, Bardot provoked controversy as an animal rights activist. She was convicted and fined at least five times in France for inciting racial hatred over her remarks about Muslims.

Her unorthodox viewpoints continued to make headlines until as recently as 2025, when she spoke out in defense of former fellow star Gerard Depardieu, who was facing sexual assault accusations. This came after her previous comments deriding many accusers in the wake of the #MeToo movement.

However, her advocacy for animals didn’t know any ideological boundaries. She ridiculed 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin as “a disgrace to women” over the candidate’s views on global warming and gun rights.

And more recently, she denounced President Donald Trump when he initially sought to remove restrictions on importing African elephant trophies (a move he later put on hold): “Your shameful actions confirm the rumors that you are unfit for office,” she wrote in a letter to the US leader, according to Agence France-Presse.

But she denied ever being political, telling Vanity Fair in 2012 that everything she did was “motivated by the defense of animals.”

“I don’t feel old or used up,” Bardot, then nearly 80, told the magazine, “and I don’t have time to waste thinking about aging, because I live only for my cause.” — Agencies