Paris, France   –   French screen icon Brigitte Bardot had undergone two operations for cancer before she succumbed to the disease last month, her husband told Paris Match magazine in an interview published ahead of her funeral on Wednesday. The actor dealt with the two procedures very well, Bernard d’Ormale told the magazine, as well-wishers gathered in Saint-Tropez on Wednesday for a church service and burial. No cause of death had been given for Bardot, who passed away aged 91 on December 28 at her home, known as la Madrague, on the French Riviera. The animal rights actress, who recovered from breast cancer in the 1980s, was known to have been hospitalised twice in late 2025. “She always absolutely wanted to go back to La Madrague,” d’Ormale said. “And there, it was more complicated, notably because of back pain that wouldn’t go away, that made her suffer and exhausted her. “It was uncomfortable, even when she was bedridden,” he added. 

“However, she remained conscious and concerned about the fate of animals until the very end.” 

D’Ormale, a former political advisor to far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen, did not specify which type of cancer Bardot had been suffering from.