Brigitte Bardot, 91, releases statement denying she has died and says ‘I have no intention of bowing out’ following hospital stay

Brigitte Bardot was forced to issue a statement confirming that she did not die after being hospitalized on Wednesday.

The 91-year-old actress was outraged when Aqababe, a hugely popular influencer specializing in celebrity news in her home country, told her that Brigitte had passed away in the South of France.

In his posts on X and Instagram, Aqababe wrote: ‘According to my private information, Brigitte Bardot died today.

‘His coffin was ordered at Saint-Paul-de-Jarrat in department 09 (Ariège).’

Aqaba, whose real name is Aniss Zitouni (27), added: ‘An icon who left behind an unforgettable legacy and an eternal mark in the hearts of the French has passed away.’

But a few hours later, Brigitte went to ‘A word to the wise’.

Brigitte announced to ‘A word to the wise’

The statement comes after Brigitte returned from hospital earlier this month following minor surgery for an unspecified illness.

After more than three weeks of treatment at a private hospital near Toulon, he returned to his home in Saint-Tropez on the Riviera.

A spokesperson for the French actress told the Daily Mail: ‘Madame Bardot has returned home and is currently resting. He’s fine.”

Last week, French media reported that Brigitte was in hospital due to a serious illness and was undergoing surgery.

He was staying at his home in Saint-Tropez when he was taken to a hospital in Toulon.

In July 2023, it was reported that the star was experiencing respiratory problems due to soaring temperatures in Saint-Tropez that summer.

Paramedics treated him at his home in the south of France after he had difficulty breathing.

The actress’s husband, Bernard d’Ormale, told Var-Matin at the time: ‘It was around 9am when Brigitte had difficulty breathing’ and described the health scare as a ‘respiratory disorder’.

The movie star had surgery and is said to be ‘fine’ according to a rep (Photo taken in 1970)

The 91-year-old actor was furious when Aqababe (pictured), a hugely popular influencer in his home country specializing in celebrity news, told him that Brigitte had passed away in the South of France.

In his posts on X and Instagram, Aqababe wrote: ‘According to my private information, Brigitte Bardot died today’

He said: ‘[Her breathing] He was stronger than ever but did not lose consciousness. Let’s call it a momentary respiratory distraction.’

Brigitte was given oxygen by doctors and they “stayed to watch her” for a while before leaving the actress’ home.

Bernard shared: ‘Like all people of a certain age, he can’t stand the heat anymore. He would be 88 years old. ‘One should not make unnecessary efforts.’

The actress debuted in 1952 with the film Bikini Girl and became one of the most famous French film stars of the post-war period.

In 1956, Brigitte starred with her estranged husband Roger Vadim in And God Created Woman, which became the highest-grossing foreign film released in the United States despite Hollywood’s censorship cuts.

The Parisian was no newcomer to cinema, having starred in many films before and earning the nickname “sex kitten”.

American theater managers were arrested for showing his exploits on the big screen, but press outrage only appealed to audiences. In 1957, priests in New York told people not to watch Bardot’s films. Six years later, the Vatican, which accused Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton of ‘erotic vagrancy’, accused Bardot of being ‘evil’.

“There lies Brigitte, stretched from one end of the screen to the other, bottom up and naked as a censor’s eye,” one critic grumbled in a review intended to appeal to morality. Ticket queues got longer.

She had a son, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, with her second husband in 1960 (pictured) but she was not a mother and called her unborn baby a ‘cancerous tumour’

The controversy didn’t hurt his career. Bardot appeared in more than 45 films and recorded more than 70 songs before retiring in the early 1970s.

John Lennon was a big fan of the French star, famous for his poster hanging on his childhood bedroom wall; The two met briefly in 1968.

Born in Paris on September 28, 1934, she first trained as a ballet dancer at the Paris National Higher Conservatory of Music and Dance.

At the age of 15, Brigette appeared on the front cover of France’s Elle magazine and began to establish herself as a model.

Her acting career began in 1952, appearing in a series of obscure roles, but she soon began to attract attention when she frolicked on the beach in a tiny bikini at the Cannes Film Festival in 1953.

He said: ‘Yes, I knew I was ugly when I was a child. I said to myself: “I’m ugly, so I should at least be smart and funny and have other things to make up for it.”

‘I knew I had to be the best at something, otherwise I would be nothing. ‘I knew I wanted the world to know about Brigitte Bardot.’

The artist, who has never adhered to tradition, posed nude in Playboy to celebrate her 40th birthday.

She created the Bardot pose, in which she sits with her legs crossed, wearing only a pair of black socks, and because she made the style famous, the Bardot collar was named after her.

Brigitte was married four times, to Roger Vadim (1952-57), Jacques Charrier (1959-62), Gunter Sachs (1966-69) and Bernard d’Ormale, whom she married in 1992.

She welcomed a son, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, with her second husband in 1960, but she was not a mother and described her unborn baby as a ‘cancerous tumour’.

She would have preferred to have an abortion, but that possibility was too scandalous, let alone illegal. ‘I want there to be no hypocrisy, no nonsense about love,’ she said sternly, and confessed soon after the birth: ‘I started screaming, begging them to take him away from me. ‘I never wanted to see him again.’

Nicolas was raised by Charrier’s family. She led a life that Bardot had no idea about when she was growing up. When he married a Norwegian supermodel in 1984, her mother was not invited to the wedding.

The actor-turned-animal rights activist has been married to far-right political aide Bernard d’Ormale since 1992 (pictured together in 1994)

They had no contact until 1996, when he sued her for invasion of privacy for what she wrote about him in a book. He was ordered to pay compensation. Mother and son have since reconciled.

Talking about motherhood, she said: ‘I was not created to be a mother. I don’t know why I think this way because I love animals and children but I’m not adult enough. I know it’s terrible to have to admit this, but I’m not adult enough to care for a child.

Many lovers have come and gone, including singer-songwriter Sacha Distel and actor Warren Beatty.

‘I always looked for passion,’ he explained. ‘So I was unfaithful most of the time. ‘I was packing my bags as the passion was ending.’

Serge Gainsbourg wrote the suggestive song Je T’aime Moi Non Plus (I Love You – It’s Not Me Anymore) after his fling with the actress.

One co-star who did not win Bardot’s favor, even briefly, was Sean Connery. ‘I never gave in to his charm,’ he said. Or probably it was her wig.

Her retirement from acting in 1973 took her life in a different direction, and she founded the Brigitte Bardot Foundation in 1986. He was a committed vegetarian and regularly campaigned for animal rights.

In 2013, a pair of 42-year-old elephants at a zoo in Lyon threatened to seek Russian citizenship and leave France after being denied treatment for tuberculosis.

He described France as an ‘animal cemetery’ but eventually won the case and rescued two former circus animals.

In 2001 he also donated £96,671 over two years to the sterilization and adoption of 300,000 stray dogs in Bucharest.

Not all of her activism work since retiring from acting has been so well received.

He was found guilty by a French court in 2004 and fined £4,000 for ‘inciting racial hatred’ in his book A Cry in the Silence.

He supported Marine Le Pen in the 2017 French elections and told people not to vote for Emmanuel Macron because there was ‘coldness’ in his ‘steel eyes’.

‘Brigitte Bardot’s husband is a friend of Jean-Marie Le Pen, but neither of them are party members. Her close friend Marie-Dominique Lelièvre said Bardot was not a racist or a far-right activist. ‘Bardot is Bardot, she defies definition.’