Brigitte Bardot’s rejection of fame was her most radical act
In 1956, Brigitte Bardot was invited to the Royal Command Film Performance in London, where she would be presented to Queen Elizabeth II. She was thrilled – not only to meet our queen, but the other one too: Marilyn Monroe would also be present. Bardot later recalled the evening with a mixture of awe and amusement. Monroe, she insisted, was the real star: radiant, charming, fragile. This brief encounter between the two most famous blondes in cinema history captured, in miniature, a fork in the road between two kinds of fame. Six years later, Monroe would be dead. She was found nude in her Los Angeles home, killed by a drug overdose, aged just 36. Even in death, her body was not left alone: a photograph was released to the press, as if the spectacle required one last offering.
