French Cinema Icon Brigitte Bardot became one of the most recognizable women of the 20th century, though motherhood proved to be the role she struggled with most. A model, actress, singer, and global icon, her image helped shape an era of cinema and culture.
âIâm not made to be a mother,â Bardot wrote in her 1990 memoir Initiales B.B, as reported by The Daily Mail. âIâm not adult enough â I know itâs horrible to have to admit that, but Iâm not adult enough to take care of a child.â
Despite her reservations, Bardot welcomed her only child, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, in 1960 with then-husband Jacques Charrier. As he grew older, Nicolas chose a life away from his motherâs fame, building his own family and maintaining a level of privacy that Bardot herself later came to respect.
The Birth of Nicolas-Jacques Charrier and His Early Years
Bardot welcomed her son Nicolas-Jacques Charrier on January 11, 1960, during a home birth at the coupleâs Paris apartment. A birth announcement published by The New York Times reported that Nicolas weighed 7 pounds at birth.
In her memoir Initiales B.B., Bardot wrote candidly about the pregnancy and her emotional state at the time.
âI looked at my flat, slender belly in the mirror like a dear friend upon whom I was about to close a coffin lid,â she wrote, as per BBC.
After Bardot and Charrier divorced in 1962, custody of Nicolas was awarded to his father.
Growing Up Away From the Spotlight
After the divorce, Nicolas was largely raised by his paternal grandparents. Bardot later addressed that decision in interviews, reflecting on her own instability at the time.
âI didnât bring up Nicolas because I needed support, roots,â she once said, as reported by The Times. âI couldnât be Nicolasâ roots because I was completely uprooted, unbalanced, lost in that crazy world.â
As he grew older, Nicolas chose a quiet life away from the public attention that followed his mother for decades. He built a private family life and remained largely out of the spotlight.
A Relationship Defined by Boundaries and Mutual Respect
Ahead of the release of Initiales B.B., Nicolas and his father, Jacques Charrier, attempted to prevent sections of the memoir that referenced them from being published. The effort was unsuccessful, and those passages became some of the most widely discussed parts of the book.
Over time, contact between Bardot and her son remained limited but respectful. The LA Times reported that in 1992, when Bardot married Bernard dâOrmale, the ceremony took place in Norway, near where Nicolas and his family were living.
âTwo weeks after we met, Brigitte phoned Nicolas because she wanted him to meet me, and we agreed to go and see him in Norway,â dâOrmale told People in 1992.
âJust before we left, she said, âWhy donât we get married while we are there?â So we did. But quietly. I am not a man for the limelight. Only close friends of ours knew.â
In her later years, Bardot became increasingly careful about discussing her son publicly. In a 2024 interview published by Paris Match (as reported by Le Point), she explained that she had promised Nicolas she would no longer speak about him in interviews, a boundary she honored mainly in her final decades.
Through Nicolas, Bardot became a grandmother and great-grandmother. In the end, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier chose a life far from fame, preserving his privacy while remaining part of Brigitte Bardotâs personal legacy beyond the screen.
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