Opinion Bikini Tropez

The unpretentious fishing village of St Tropez was the first town Operation Dragoon liberated during World War II. Its agreeable,light-filled climate inspired and attracted writers and painters like Matisse,Pierre Bonnard and Albert Marquet. The painting styles of pointillism and Fauvism emerged at St Tropez. But it was the Bardot phenomenon that definitively changed St Tropez. The so-called sex kitten’s coveted presence snatched away Monte Carlo’s glitterati image to turn St Tropez into the new jet-set destination for the world’s who’s who.

Bardot’s family had a vacation home in St Tropez. At age 15,she was selected as cover girl of French Elle magazine. Film director Roger Vadim zeroed in to marry her. His 1956 controversial film And God Made Woman with Bardot playing an immoral,small-town French Riviera teenage girl who had a sensational effect on men catapulted her to international stardom. Her luscious screen image with pouting lips,wild eyes and scantily clad flirtatious postures zapped the world. She won global success,especially in the US. “I owe everything to the Americans,” she says,although Hollywood never succeeded in luring her there.

Her love life of four marriages and famous liaisons—artist Pablo Picasso,sculptor Miroslav Brozek,and singer-composer Serge Gainsbourg—was as colourful as her eventful 47-film career,many musical shows and 50 songs. She starred in films by renowned directors Jean Luc Godard,Louis Malle and acted with notable actors like Jacques Charrier,her second husband,Sean Connery,Kirk Douglas,Alain Delon among others. During her torrid affair with the celebrated Gainsbourg,he wrote for her the erotic song Je t’aime mois non plus. But she begged him to not release it as her third husband,German millionaire Gunter Sachs,was livid. Later when Gainsbourg recorded the song with Jane Birkin,it became an international hit,and Bardot was furious. In another Gainsbourg composition,she wore tight leather pants,high boots,a flimsy top revealing her perfect body,gripped the handlebars of a motorcycle,threw herself on to the big machine and sang sensually,“I don’t need anyone on my Harley Davidson. I push the starter and immediately leave the earth for heaven nonstop. The vibrations of my machine make me feel desirous deep inside. I go faster than 100 and feel like fire and blood.”

Then suddenly,just before she turned 39,she abandoned her sizzling career and menagerie of men to fight the cause of animals from her secluded St Tropez country home. When I asked Tropezians at the local creperie restaurant,there was long gossip about her wearing only black jeans and her sincere obsession with the animal rights cause. The chef described how she’s turned into a vegetarian and lives in a kind of lost paradise with her 4th husband Bernard d’Ormale and lots of dogs and cats.

To support the animal rights campaign,Bardot raised 3 million francs in 1977 by auctioning her dresses,souvenirs and jewellry. She’s backed efforts to end baby seals being killed in Canada,opposed the transport and slaughter of horses,bullfights,hunting,wearing of fur and industrial animal farms including over-feeding of ducks to make foie gras. In 1999,she wrote to the then Chinese president Jiang Zemin accusing the Chinese of “torturing bears and killing the world’s last tigers and rhinos to make aphrodisiacs”. She’s donated over $140,000 for mass sterilisation and an adoption programme for Bucharest’s 300,000 stray dogs. In August 2010,she wrote to Margrethe II,Queen of Denmark,to appeal against the killing of dolphins in Faroe Islands. She’s asked the French foreign affairs minister to pressure Japan against whale hunting,and the French agriculture minister against the horrors of slaughterhouses. She’s thanked Russia’s Vladimir Putin for protecting wolves and banning sealskin trade.

In 1970,sculptor Alain Gourdon used Bardot to model for the bust of Marianne,the French national emblem. She’s been idolised by the prominent too,including the Beatles John Lennon and Paul McCartney,while singer Bob Dylan mentioned her in his song,I shall be free. Existential philosopher and feminist Simone de Beauvoir paid her the ultimate compliment in The Lolita Syndrome in 1959. She described Bardot as a “locomotive of women’s history”,and declared her the first and most liberated woman of post-war France. Indeed,a fitting tribute to a legend. By wearing a mere bikini and revealing her entertainment skills,Brigitte Bardot has transformed the economy of seaside town St Tropez,making it a playhouse for the wealthy elite and a tourist haven for millions of global travellers.

Shombit Sengupta is an international consultant to top management on differentiating business strategy with execution excellence (www.shiningconsulting.com)