JANE BIRKIN
(14 December 1946 - 16 July 2023)
The London-born actress and singer Jane Birkin has died aged 76 following a stroke in 2021. She became a celebrity when she moved to France as the partner of the actor and musician Serge Gainsbourg. Having met him while working on the film Slogan (1968), she stayed with him for twelve years, never married but had a daughter (the successful actress Charlotte Gainsbourg). The couple became famous through the recording of his song ‘Je t'aime moi non plus’. Originally written for Brigitte Bardot, it was considered way too sexy which led to its banning by radio stations in Spain, the UK and the Vatican. Of all the work that Birkin did as both an actress and singer, she reckoned she would be remembered only for that one song which also became a film for which she was nominated for a César in 1976. In the UK, however, the latter was refused a certificate by the British Board of Film Classification.
Jane Mallory Birkin was the daughter of the English actress Judy Campbell and the Royal Navy lieutenant commander David Birkin. At school on the Isle of Wight she was mocked for her plain Jane looks, but aged just 17 she married the composer John Barry. They were together from 1965 to 1968 and had a daughter, Kate (who died in 2013). When Barry left for the US, Jane had small parts in Richard Lester’s The Knack, Daniel Petrie’s The Idol, Jack Smight’s Kaleidoscope, Joe Massot’s Wonderwall and Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blow Up, the latter featuring the first scene to show pubic hair (often cited as Jane Birkin’s, the intimate fuzz actually belonged to co-star Gillian Hills). Her first film in France was Jacques Deray’s La piscine (The Swimming Pool), a revenge drama with Alain Delon and Romy Schneider.
The French seemed to take to Birkin, calling her ‘la petite anglaise’, so more films were forthcoming, including Les chemins de Katmandu from Andre Cayatte, three with Gainsbourg, Slogan, Cannabis and Romance of a Horsethief. Dark Places (1973) was a British horror film with Robert Hardy, Christopher Lee and Joan Collins. Roger Vadim directed Birkin and Bardot in his erotic drama, Don Juan or If Don Juan Were a Woman, also 1973. Death on the Nile and Evil Under the Sun were two Agatha Christie adaptations with Peter Ustinov as Poirot. In 1984 she made The Pirate and Comedy! for director Jacques Doillon who became her partner after she split with Gainsbourg. They had a daughter, the actress and model Lou Doillon. In 1987 Birkin worked with Jean-Luc Godard after which Agnes Varda gave her three roles to play in Jane B par Agnes V including Calamity Jane and Joan of Arc! She was also in Varda’s Kung-fu master and 101 Nights.
Daddy nostalgie (aka These Foolish Things) was Bertrand Tavernier’s story of a daughter finally bonding with her dying father. It featured Dirk Bogarde in his last film. Jacques Rivette’s La belle noiseuse with Birkin and Michel Piccoli was an epic about a painter and his final work. Rivette also directed Birkin in his last film, Around a Small Mountain. Same Old Song was a comedy from Alain Resnais and A Soldier’s Daughter Never Cries was James Ivory’s fictionalised biopic of the writer James Jones. In 2006 Birkin wrote and directed Boxes, with Piccoli, Geraldine Chaplin and John Hurt, based on her own family life, ‘marriages’ and children. She made films up to 2021’s Jane by Charlotte, an intimate documentary that Charlotte Gainsbourg wrote and directed, appearing on screen alongside her mother.
Apart from her acting, Jane Birkin was a successful singer and recording artist. She made thirteen studio albums and six live recordings between 1969 and 2020. Gainsbourg had died in 1991 but in 2017 she released Birkin/Gainsbourg: Le Symphonique, a collection of orchestrated songs he had written for her. She was awarded an OBE for acting and for UK-French cultural relations, the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and the French Ordre National du Mérite. The Birkin leather weekend bag was made for her by the Hermes firm and it became the luxury status symbol to acquire.
MICHAEL DARVELL