Brigitte Bardot’s funeral draws a crowd in a small French town

Brigitte Bardot’s funeral was held on Wednesday with a private service and a public memorial service in Saint-Tropez, the French Riviera resort where she lived more than half a century after retiring from acting in her prime.

The animal rights activist and far-right supporter died on December 28 at the age of 91 at his home in southern France.

She died of cancer after two operations, said her husband, Bernard d’Ormale, in an interview with Paris Match magazine released on Tuesday evening. “He was knowledgeable and concerned about the fate of the animals until the end,” he said.

Residents and well-wishers applauded the funeral procession as the coffin of Bardot, once one of the world’s most photographed women and the defining smile of the 1960s, was carried through the city’s narrow streets.

The service began with a recording of Maria Callas singing Hail Mary in the Catholic Church of Notre-Dame-de-l’Assomption are Bardot’s husband, son and grandchildren, as well as guests invited by the family and the Brigitte Bardot Foundation for the protection of animals.

“Grief is strange, and painful,” said Max Guazzini, a friend and general secretary of his organization, speaking to mourners.

Hundreds of people gathered in the small town to watch the farewell on the big screens placed in the harbor and two plazas.

Bardot had long called Saint-Tropez her refuge from the celebrity who once made her a household name. He was buried “very privately” in a cemetery overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

The cemetery is also the final resting place of several cultural figures, including film producer Roger Vadim, Bardot’s first husband, who directed her breakthrough film. And God Created Womana role that made him a worldwide star.

Bardot settled down in the last decades at her seaside villa, La Madrague, and retired from filmmaking in 1973 at the age of 39, during an international career that included more than a dozen films.

Argument later in life

While he retired from the film industry, he remained a visible and often controversial figure through decades of animal rights advocacy and far-flung political links.

He opposition to hippo hunting in Newfoundland was criticized for degrading Aboriginal ways of life, too he was convicted and fined five times in French courts for inciting racial hatred, in incidents fueled by his opposition to the Muslim practice of slaughtering sheep during annual religious holidays.

“It’s true that sometimes I get carried away, but when I see how things are going slowly … my depression takes over,” Bardot told the Associated Press when asked about her anti-racist beliefs and opposition to Islamic ritual killings.