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Bardot, Deneuve, Fonda
Highlighted by more than one hundred personal photographs, this intimate memoir recounts the noted director's private and professional relationships with three of the screen's most talented and beautiful actresses
328 pages, Hardcover
First published February 1, 1986
About the author
Roger Vadim
20 books3 followersVadim was born as Roger Vadim Plemiannikov in Paris. His father, Igor Nikolaevich Plemiannikov (И́горь Никола́евич Племя́нников), a White Russian military officer and pianist, had emigrated from Ukraine and became a naturalized French citizen, and was a vice consul of France to Egypt, stationed in Alexandria. His mother, Marie-Antoinette (née Ardilouze), was a French writer, and essayist. Although Vadim lived as a diplomat's child in Northern Africa and the Middle East in his early youth, the death of his father, when Vadim was nine years old, caused the family to return to France, where his mother found work running a hostel in the French Alps, which was functioning as a way-station for Jews and other fugitives fleeing Nazism.
Vadim studied journalism and writing at the University of Paris, without graduating. At age 19, he became assistant to film director Marc Allégret, whom he met while working at the Theatre Sarah Bernhardt, and for whom he worked on several screenplays.
Vadim was celebrated for his romances/marriages to beautiful actresses. In his mid-30s, he lived with the teenaged Catherine Deneuve, by whom he had a child, Christian Vadim, prior to his marriage to Fonda.[6] He was also involved with actress Cindy Pickett. Later, he cohabited with screenwriter Ann Biderman for several years, announcing their engagement in 1984, but the couple never wed.
He told a story about how he lost his virginity. When he was 16, he spent the summer in Normandy, where an older girl took a fancy to him. Out of doors that night, she introduced him to the art of love and what amazed him most was that what Hemingway had written came true--"the earth moved under him". Not until somewhat later did he realize that Allied ships were bombarding the coast in preparation for the D-day invasion.
Marriages:-
Brigitte Bardot, 20 December 1952 – 6 December 1957 (divorced)
Annette Stroyberg, 17 June 1958 – 14 March 1961 (divorced); 1 daughter (Nathalie)
Jane Fonda, 14 August 1965 – 16 January 1973 (divorced); 1 daughter (Vanessa)
Catherine Schneider, 13 December 1975 – 10 June 1977 (divorced); 1 son (Vania)
Ann Biderman, Common Law Spouse (California)
Marie-Christine Barrault, 21 December 1990 – 11 February 2000 (his death)
He also had two stepsons from his marriage to Schneider (heiress to the Schneider-Creusot steel and armaments firm) as well as adult stepchildren from Barrault's first marriage to Daniel Toscan du Plantier, also a friend of Vadim's, who called him "a happy man. He was someone in whom there was so much satisfaction to the end of his life. The films merely reflected his happiness." Nathalie, his eldest child, told Fonda biographer Patricia Bosworth: "Jane was the love of my father's life."
In addition to Vadim's theatre and film work, he also wrote several books, including the memoirs "Memoires du Diable," "Le Gout du Bonheur: Souvenirs 1940-1958" and an autobiography, D'une étoile à l'autre (From One Star to the Next) as well as a tell-all about his most famous exes, Bardot, Deneuve & Fonda: My Life with the Three Most Beautiful Women in the World, published in 1986. "My attitude is that if this book makes me a little money it will be a tiny compensation for all the money I helped those actresses make," Vadim explained. He also wrote several plays and books of fiction, including "L'Ange Affame".
Vadim studied journalism and writing at the University of Paris, without graduating. At age 19, he became assistant to film director Marc Allégret, whom he met while working at the Theatre Sarah Bernhardt, and for whom he worked on several screenplays.
Vadim was celebrated for his romances/marriages to beautiful actresses. In his mid-30s, he lived with the teenaged Catherine Deneuve, by whom he had a child, Christian Vadim, prior to his marriage to Fonda.[6] He was also involved with actress Cindy Pickett. Later, he cohabited with screenwriter Ann Biderman for several years, announcing their engagement in 1984, but the couple never wed.
He told a story about how he lost his virginity. When he was 16, he spent the summer in Normandy, where an older girl took a fancy to him. Out of doors that night, she introduced him to the art of love and what amazed him most was that what Hemingway had written came true--"the earth moved under him". Not until somewhat later did he realize that Allied ships were bombarding the coast in preparation for the D-day invasion.
Marriages:-
Brigitte Bardot, 20 December 1952 – 6 December 1957 (divorced)
Annette Stroyberg, 17 June 1958 – 14 March 1961 (divorced); 1 daughter (Nathalie)
Jane Fonda, 14 August 1965 – 16 January 1973 (divorced); 1 daughter (Vanessa)
Catherine Schneider, 13 December 1975 – 10 June 1977 (divorced); 1 son (Vania)
Ann Biderman, Common Law Spouse (California)
Marie-Christine Barrault, 21 December 1990 – 11 February 2000 (his death)
He also had two stepsons from his marriage to Schneider (heiress to the Schneider-Creusot steel and armaments firm) as well as adult stepchildren from Barrault's first marriage to Daniel Toscan du Plantier, also a friend of Vadim's, who called him "a happy man. He was someone in whom there was so much satisfaction to the end of his life. The films merely reflected his happiness." Nathalie, his eldest child, told Fonda biographer Patricia Bosworth: "Jane was the love of my father's life."
In addition to Vadim's theatre and film work, he also wrote several books, including the memoirs "Memoires du Diable," "Le Gout du Bonheur: Souvenirs 1940-1958" and an autobiography, D'une étoile à l'autre (From One Star to the Next) as well as a tell-all about his most famous exes, Bardot, Deneuve & Fonda: My Life with the Three Most Beautiful Women in the World, published in 1986. "My attitude is that if this book makes me a little money it will be a tiny compensation for all the money I helped those actresses make," Vadim explained. He also wrote several plays and books of fiction, including "L'Ange Affame".
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
December 17, 2021
Mr. Vadim was married to three of the most beautiful women in the world. He spends a lot of time telling us about that, in explicit detail that makes me wince on their behalf. It's not shocking that all the marriages ended in divorce. He's also a director, but I recall learning less about that than I had hoped, and more about every woman he has slept with and how excellent he was at it. Brigitte Bardot was fifteen when they met, but this seems to trouble me more than it troubled either of them. Does she still consider it acceptable today?
However, in her book, Jane Fonda movingly describes all three woman attending his funeral, without malice, so he must have had his good points.
However, in her book, Jane Fonda movingly describes all three woman attending his funeral, without malice, so he must have had his good points.
March 25, 2021
Roger Vadim is a marginal figure in film now —the notes to Criterion's edition of And God Created Woman pointedly put him backseat to his puppet in that film, Bardot, the way most Svengali-like males are doubly passed over— but you can imagine that he wouldn't be all that bothered by this turn in his fame, given that he got to do absolutely anything and everything he felt like doing in the second-half of the 20th century. He is the "sensitive euro man" that Pavement described, hypocritical and vain, but hey, that got him Bardot, Deneuve and Fonda (in that order).
January 31, 2020
This book is so exploitative that by the end of it, you'll feel like you fucked and mistreated these three women, too.
April 2, 2012
I lost interest. I felt it was a little too much of Roger Vadim, written in a slightly boastful style. You get the idea that he's quite pleased with himself having been involved with 3 of the (then) most beautiful women in the world. I wonder about Bardot, Deneuve and Fonda's collective opinions re Monsieur Vadim.
October 12, 2021
Needed this...now Bardot has a place to go in my memory trap. Who is this guy who ends up with three such delicious women? Patronizing, for sure. Especially so to Bardot, still angered by Deneuve, and...flustered by Fonda?
December 24, 2008
Some guys have all the luck and then get to write a book about it...thats quite a set of wives!
April 5, 2009
There is only one reason to NOT envy Roger Vadim and that is that he’s dead. Aside from that...
For filmophiles, “Bardot Deneuve Fonda: My Life With The Three Most Beautiful Women In The World,” offers intimate portraits of a trio of great mid-century actresses.
For Europhiles, it offers a panoramic view of “La Dolce Vita” on the Old Continent after World War II. A great time for those who survived the conflict in one piece.
A couple of years ago the scribe read “The Good, the Bad, and the Dolce Vita, by blacklisted actor Mickey Knox. Although enjoyable, Knox was entering the universe in question by the back door and could not write worth a lick.
Vadim’s a different case altogether. His father was the son of a Russian diplomat chased from the mother country by Bolsheviks: “Like all children of Russian diplomats, he spoke French fluently. After graduating in political science, he took the civil service examination and passed with flying colors. Named consul at the age of twenty-eight, he married a French woman, Marie-Antoinette Ardilouze. His first post was the consulate in Alexandria, Egypt.”
You get the idea.
Those hip to European culture know the best way to rebel in life is to have an aristocratic background and that is what Vadim did, throwing his lot in with the long-hairs (of his day anyway), opting for a life in film, and developing a great reputation as seducer of (younger) ladies.
His first was Brigitte Bardot whom he met on a Parisian bus when she was just 15-years-old. He spent the next few years dodging her father “Pilou,” whom was under the impression his daughter was still a virgin, when Vadim had settled that question well before they married once Brigitte turned 18.
Vadim/Bardot made a unique team, he a writer of characters for her, she the muse who played them out before the cameras. Neither could have made it without the other and it is their tale which is most interesting of the three largely because neither is famous yet, and we get to see how things evolved for them professionally.
Bardot wanted to be a prima ballerina but ended up in film, it would seem, largely because of her lack of interest in it (aspiring actresses take heed).
And although Vadim’s novel approach to film making and storytelling were crucial to harnessing Bardot’s raw rebelliousness, her raw rebelliousness was crucial to his film making/storytelling.
She had a natural and casual attitude about the world around her, most unimpressed by status and blessed with a wicked tongue. Keira Knightley’s recent turn in “Pride and Prejudice” comes to mind.
Early on (page 50), Vadim is making the rounds of haute Paris with his sexy young charge/lover/business partner. One such stop is at a famous mansion on 72 rue de Varenne, where all manner of luminaries are gathered including a young senator from the United States, John F. Kennedy.
Again, you get the idea.
Here’s Vadim: “Among the guests was a woman whose amorous adventures had been the talk of Paris for more than thirty years. Simone Beiau, now a theater director, had been a great courtesan. Now over fifty, she had become subdued, but she remained notorious for her immoderate language. She decided to get a laugh by attacking Brigitte.
‘Are you a virgin?’ she asked her point-blank. She expected to upset the young girl and make her blush.
But without becoming flustered, Brigitte replied, ‘No, madam. Are you’?”
(And whatever happened to courtesans, anyway?)
His rendering of Bardot is that of an unstable girl desperately in love with the idea of love, but not so good at the real thing and certainly not monogamous (understandably difficult for her to achieve).
The pair’s big break came with Vadim penning and lensing (that’s Hollywood “Variety” talk for writing and directing)with Bardot as his lead, Julietta.
She appears naked, sort of, by today’s standards, but more than that comes across as a girl who enjoys sex; a posture most upsetting to the crumbling, but still deeply Catholic-bourgeois, order in France. So much so, the government tried to stop the film from screening [this is before YouTube kiddies:]. The case went to court. Vadim and producer Raoul Levy prevailed thanks to their attorney - Francois Mitterand, future president of France.
You get the idea.
Here’s an exchange between Bardot and none other than Winston Churchill, who ran into each other, per chance, in a hotel during the shooting of “And God Created Woman”:
“‘When I was eight years old and heard you on the radio, you frightened me,' said Brigitte, ‘But now you seem rather cute, considering you’re a legend.’
‘Cute’ was not a word people normally used to describe Churchill to his face! The great orator remained speechless.
‘What are you doing in Nice?’ Brigitte asked, in order to fill the silence.
‘Painting,’ replied Churchill. ‘You are an actress, and I am a painter. We have art in common.’
‘My father bought one of your landscapes,’ said Brigitte.
‘I don’t sell my paintings.’
‘Well, then your friends do. The painting my father bought has a hill, a parasol pine in the foreground and the sea in the background. Do you remember it?’
‘And on the right a broom bush in flower?’
‘Yes. Do you like to paint?’
‘I love painting. But I shall never go down in history with Cézanne.’
‘You know, my films are not nearly as good as your paintings. And I never won a war.’
‘That is no great loss,’ Churchill concluded.”
A couple of days later, old Winny tried to get Brigitte to come by for dinner!
As hinted above, Bardot turns out to be more than a little unfaithful to Vadim, who moves on to marry a Danish women named Annette, whom he puts in a movie and loses to her desires for fame and fortune, film style.
Then he hooks up with Catherine Deneuve. By now Vadim is a famous MAN OF FILM and 17- year-old hotties with stardust in their eyes come his way regularly, so there’s less intrigue than with Bardot, a more ingenuous romance in the springtime of their loving.
He is thirty-two, at this point, and after a few comings and goings, sets up his seduction of C. “But age didn’t make a difference,” he wrote, “Neither did experience, for women know many things without needing to learn them.”
Now, that may not sound like overheated and steamy prose to you, but the scribe has vivid enough imagination to plug-in a young Catherine Deneuve – the one wearing the Chanel outfit in Polansky’s “Repulsion” – for things to get hot and steamy without any verbal assistance whatsoever.
Deneuve is beautiful, but she is stern, and cool and rather domestic for a flaming faux blonde and French siren. As such, Vadim’s continuing adventures as a race car driver for Ferrari, as a friend of eccentric aristocrats, and denizen of exciting Latin countries take over at this juncture in this autobiography.
After C. dumps Vadim, he moves on to an up-and-coming Jane Fonda, who enters at about age 17. Again, there are many reasons to envy and despise Roger Vadim, were he not gone from us.
Their idyllic life on a farm somewhere near Versailles is enough to depress any American middle-classer and one has to wonder why Fonda, Hollywood royalty, with a film or two under her belt, would want to give up this paradise to get half-naked, smooch with men she doesn’t know, and do press junkets for films.
The rendering of Fonda is one of a conflicted little girl trying many ways to grow up. The contrast between the two French women, hurtling at warp speed into sex and serious life, and the American girl, hung up on “finding herself,” is rather revealing.
Jane, casting about in the lap of luxury and under the entire world’s gaze, finds herself as an opponent to the Vietnam War, and it’s only a matter of time before Vadim moves onto his fifth wife and first non-actress.
It’s surprising Fonda found no room in her life for Vadim following her transformation. It was he who introduced her to another understanding of the United States beyond her own apple-pie version, and Vadim himself seemed to walk into historical situations by happenstance.
Just before the outbreak of the May ‘68 rebellion in Paris, he finds himself chosen by a dissident faction of the film industry’s workers and technicians union to lead them. He wins the election, the riots break out, and Vadim finds himself a front-and-center-protagonist in the dramatic events that follow.
A brilliant intellectual (is there another kind?), his thoughts on these moments and others are worth the read even if you’re in it just for the cheesecake.
When Fonda tells him she thinks, “The government will be overthrown,” he tells her, “I’m convinced of the contrary. The Communists have mobilized their troops and joined the students’ camp in order to take control of the situation and nip the movement in the bud. They can’t accept a revolution that outflanks them on the left. The Communist Party will not admit it, but it is the government’s potential ally.”
Which is what came to pass.
“Few people made the same political calculation as I did. Even the president of the Republic, General de Gaulle, believing his government had lost the battle, left Paris secretly by helicopter to get the support of the French occupation army in Germany.”
And why should he be humble, bumble?
Vadim’s life with Jane eventually jumped from France to Malibu, California where, despite their fading romance, he has a great time anyway hanging out with Jack Nicholson, or Andy Warhol, or Larry Hagman...
...but you get the idea.
For filmophiles, “Bardot Deneuve Fonda: My Life With The Three Most Beautiful Women In The World,” offers intimate portraits of a trio of great mid-century actresses.
For Europhiles, it offers a panoramic view of “La Dolce Vita” on the Old Continent after World War II. A great time for those who survived the conflict in one piece.
A couple of years ago the scribe read “The Good, the Bad, and the Dolce Vita, by blacklisted actor Mickey Knox. Although enjoyable, Knox was entering the universe in question by the back door and could not write worth a lick.
Vadim’s a different case altogether. His father was the son of a Russian diplomat chased from the mother country by Bolsheviks: “Like all children of Russian diplomats, he spoke French fluently. After graduating in political science, he took the civil service examination and passed with flying colors. Named consul at the age of twenty-eight, he married a French woman, Marie-Antoinette Ardilouze. His first post was the consulate in Alexandria, Egypt.”
You get the idea.
Those hip to European culture know the best way to rebel in life is to have an aristocratic background and that is what Vadim did, throwing his lot in with the long-hairs (of his day anyway), opting for a life in film, and developing a great reputation as seducer of (younger) ladies.
His first was Brigitte Bardot whom he met on a Parisian bus when she was just 15-years-old. He spent the next few years dodging her father “Pilou,” whom was under the impression his daughter was still a virgin, when Vadim had settled that question well before they married once Brigitte turned 18.
Vadim/Bardot made a unique team, he a writer of characters for her, she the muse who played them out before the cameras. Neither could have made it without the other and it is their tale which is most interesting of the three largely because neither is famous yet, and we get to see how things evolved for them professionally.
Bardot wanted to be a prima ballerina but ended up in film, it would seem, largely because of her lack of interest in it (aspiring actresses take heed).
And although Vadim’s novel approach to film making and storytelling were crucial to harnessing Bardot’s raw rebelliousness, her raw rebelliousness was crucial to his film making/storytelling.
She had a natural and casual attitude about the world around her, most unimpressed by status and blessed with a wicked tongue. Keira Knightley’s recent turn in “Pride and Prejudice” comes to mind.
Early on (page 50), Vadim is making the rounds of haute Paris with his sexy young charge/lover/business partner. One such stop is at a famous mansion on 72 rue de Varenne, where all manner of luminaries are gathered including a young senator from the United States, John F. Kennedy.
Again, you get the idea.
Here’s Vadim: “Among the guests was a woman whose amorous adventures had been the talk of Paris for more than thirty years. Simone Beiau, now a theater director, had been a great courtesan. Now over fifty, she had become subdued, but she remained notorious for her immoderate language. She decided to get a laugh by attacking Brigitte.
‘Are you a virgin?’ she asked her point-blank. She expected to upset the young girl and make her blush.
But without becoming flustered, Brigitte replied, ‘No, madam. Are you’?”
(And whatever happened to courtesans, anyway?)
His rendering of Bardot is that of an unstable girl desperately in love with the idea of love, but not so good at the real thing and certainly not monogamous (understandably difficult for her to achieve).
The pair’s big break came with Vadim penning and lensing (that’s Hollywood “Variety” talk for writing and directing)with Bardot as his lead, Julietta.
She appears naked, sort of, by today’s standards, but more than that comes across as a girl who enjoys sex; a posture most upsetting to the crumbling, but still deeply Catholic-bourgeois, order in France. So much so, the government tried to stop the film from screening [this is before YouTube kiddies:]. The case went to court. Vadim and producer Raoul Levy prevailed thanks to their attorney - Francois Mitterand, future president of France.
You get the idea.
Here’s an exchange between Bardot and none other than Winston Churchill, who ran into each other, per chance, in a hotel during the shooting of “And God Created Woman”:
“‘When I was eight years old and heard you on the radio, you frightened me,' said Brigitte, ‘But now you seem rather cute, considering you’re a legend.’
‘Cute’ was not a word people normally used to describe Churchill to his face! The great orator remained speechless.
‘What are you doing in Nice?’ Brigitte asked, in order to fill the silence.
‘Painting,’ replied Churchill. ‘You are an actress, and I am a painter. We have art in common.’
‘My father bought one of your landscapes,’ said Brigitte.
‘I don’t sell my paintings.’
‘Well, then your friends do. The painting my father bought has a hill, a parasol pine in the foreground and the sea in the background. Do you remember it?’
‘And on the right a broom bush in flower?’
‘Yes. Do you like to paint?’
‘I love painting. But I shall never go down in history with Cézanne.’
‘You know, my films are not nearly as good as your paintings. And I never won a war.’
‘That is no great loss,’ Churchill concluded.”
A couple of days later, old Winny tried to get Brigitte to come by for dinner!
As hinted above, Bardot turns out to be more than a little unfaithful to Vadim, who moves on to marry a Danish women named Annette, whom he puts in a movie and loses to her desires for fame and fortune, film style.
Then he hooks up with Catherine Deneuve. By now Vadim is a famous MAN OF FILM and 17- year-old hotties with stardust in their eyes come his way regularly, so there’s less intrigue than with Bardot, a more ingenuous romance in the springtime of their loving.
He is thirty-two, at this point, and after a few comings and goings, sets up his seduction of C. “But age didn’t make a difference,” he wrote, “Neither did experience, for women know many things without needing to learn them.”
Now, that may not sound like overheated and steamy prose to you, but the scribe has vivid enough imagination to plug-in a young Catherine Deneuve – the one wearing the Chanel outfit in Polansky’s “Repulsion” – for things to get hot and steamy without any verbal assistance whatsoever.
Deneuve is beautiful, but she is stern, and cool and rather domestic for a flaming faux blonde and French siren. As such, Vadim’s continuing adventures as a race car driver for Ferrari, as a friend of eccentric aristocrats, and denizen of exciting Latin countries take over at this juncture in this autobiography.
After C. dumps Vadim, he moves on to an up-and-coming Jane Fonda, who enters at about age 17. Again, there are many reasons to envy and despise Roger Vadim, were he not gone from us.
Their idyllic life on a farm somewhere near Versailles is enough to depress any American middle-classer and one has to wonder why Fonda, Hollywood royalty, with a film or two under her belt, would want to give up this paradise to get half-naked, smooch with men she doesn’t know, and do press junkets for films.
The rendering of Fonda is one of a conflicted little girl trying many ways to grow up. The contrast between the two French women, hurtling at warp speed into sex and serious life, and the American girl, hung up on “finding herself,” is rather revealing.
Jane, casting about in the lap of luxury and under the entire world’s gaze, finds herself as an opponent to the Vietnam War, and it’s only a matter of time before Vadim moves onto his fifth wife and first non-actress.
It’s surprising Fonda found no room in her life for Vadim following her transformation. It was he who introduced her to another understanding of the United States beyond her own apple-pie version, and Vadim himself seemed to walk into historical situations by happenstance.
Just before the outbreak of the May ‘68 rebellion in Paris, he finds himself chosen by a dissident faction of the film industry’s workers and technicians union to lead them. He wins the election, the riots break out, and Vadim finds himself a front-and-center-protagonist in the dramatic events that follow.
A brilliant intellectual (is there another kind?), his thoughts on these moments and others are worth the read even if you’re in it just for the cheesecake.
When Fonda tells him she thinks, “The government will be overthrown,” he tells her, “I’m convinced of the contrary. The Communists have mobilized their troops and joined the students’ camp in order to take control of the situation and nip the movement in the bud. They can’t accept a revolution that outflanks them on the left. The Communist Party will not admit it, but it is the government’s potential ally.”
Which is what came to pass.
“Few people made the same political calculation as I did. Even the president of the Republic, General de Gaulle, believing his government had lost the battle, left Paris secretly by helicopter to get the support of the French occupation army in Germany.”
And why should he be humble, bumble?
Vadim’s life with Jane eventually jumped from France to Malibu, California where, despite their fading romance, he has a great time anyway hanging out with Jack Nicholson, or Andy Warhol, or Larry Hagman...
...but you get the idea.
January 9, 2024
Roger Vadim es un director francés autor de muchas películas aunque nunca consagrado como uno de los grandes maestros. Aclamado por su película 'Y dios creo a la mujer' (1956) y popular por Barbarella (1968), se lo ha llegado a considerar un precursor o imitador de la Nouvelle Vague. Podemos decir, por lo menos, que es un autor adyacente a este movimiento. Conocido por sus tramas eróticas que ensalzan la sexualidad de sus protagonistas, con las que frecuentemente se involucraba sentimentalmente, Vadim es quizá más famoso por haberse casado con algunas de las más deseadas estrellas de los 60 y 70.
Este libro, como dice el título, es una memoria de su vida con estas mujeres (y algunas otras más) aunque también sirve como un repaso personal por la historia del cine francés y de un época de ebullición artística y política. Creo que la siguiente cita resume bastante bien todo:
«'Que vieron en usted Brigitte, Catherine (Deneuve) o Jane Fonda?' Cuantas veces no habré oído la misma pregunta.
Se han dado explicaciones para todos los gustos: que yo era una especie de campeón en la cama, o un simple vehículo hacia la fama o incluso un Svengali capaz de hechizar a jóvenes inocentes y moldearlas a mi antojo. Mi reputación es igualmente contradictoria: o soy un cínico manipulador y desenfrenado, un hedonista sin más meta que el placer, o, por el contrario, un hombre desbordado por el talento y la belleza de las mujeres que he amado y que, invariablemente, me han abandonado. He intentado determinar la verdad pero no es fácil verse con ojos totalmente objetivos, y las autocongratulaciones son embarazosas.»
Aunque reconoce esto último, el tono del libro es bastante autocomplaciente y pareciera que a Vadim todo le va bien gracias al insoportable peso de un talento descomunal, tal cual la última película de Nicolas Cage.
Este libro, como dice el título, es una memoria de su vida con estas mujeres (y algunas otras más) aunque también sirve como un repaso personal por la historia del cine francés y de un época de ebullición artística y política. Creo que la siguiente cita resume bastante bien todo:
«'Que vieron en usted Brigitte, Catherine (Deneuve) o Jane Fonda?' Cuantas veces no habré oído la misma pregunta.
Se han dado explicaciones para todos los gustos: que yo era una especie de campeón en la cama, o un simple vehículo hacia la fama o incluso un Svengali capaz de hechizar a jóvenes inocentes y moldearlas a mi antojo. Mi reputación es igualmente contradictoria: o soy un cínico manipulador y desenfrenado, un hedonista sin más meta que el placer, o, por el contrario, un hombre desbordado por el talento y la belleza de las mujeres que he amado y que, invariablemente, me han abandonado. He intentado determinar la verdad pero no es fácil verse con ojos totalmente objetivos, y las autocongratulaciones son embarazosas.»
Aunque reconoce esto último, el tono del libro es bastante autocomplaciente y pareciera que a Vadim todo le va bien gracias al insoportable peso de un talento descomunal, tal cual la última película de Nicolas Cage.
November 9, 2020
Roger Vadim has a super power. This super power is one common to many men (I confess sometimes myself included) who inherently believe everything that happens in the world involves them.
I have had this book on my to read list for years but have only manage to find it for a reasonable price recently. I am a fan of Jane Fonda and was curious to know more about the time they spent together. It is not badly written and his descriptions of Paris, Los Angeles and New York during the 60s are irresistible. But often his musings about Fonda completely miss the mark. Basically everything Fonda has achieved on her career was through him (I told you about the super power...).
3 stars, one per muse. Teachers would say he had a ‘flair for writing’. I would recommend if you are interested in that history period or the stars but also to take it with a pinch of salt ...
I have had this book on my to read list for years but have only manage to find it for a reasonable price recently. I am a fan of Jane Fonda and was curious to know more about the time they spent together. It is not badly written and his descriptions of Paris, Los Angeles and New York during the 60s are irresistible. But often his musings about Fonda completely miss the mark. Basically everything Fonda has achieved on her career was through him (I told you about the super power...).
3 stars, one per muse. Teachers would say he had a ‘flair for writing’. I would recommend if you are interested in that history period or the stars but also to take it with a pinch of salt ...
September 23, 2020
I have been aware of Vadim for some time, due to my prior reading on Bardot and watching Jane Fonda in Five Acts (I didn't know much about Deneuve), but I didn't know much about him. He doesn't go into a ton of detail about his life before marrying these beautiful women, but you get enough of a background to get a pretty good picture of his early years.
I was most interested in the Bardot part, and he did not disappoint. There are very few biographies on Bardot, so any information I can find is always helpful. He detailed their meeting and his involvement in her career and her life even after their divorce. Although I was very interested in the timeline and facts, his writing seemed to lack emotion. I would have liked to see a little more intimate details about their time together.
He surprisingly spoke quite a bit about Annette Stroyberg, his second wife, even though she is not mentioned in the book's title. I actually wished there would have been more pictures and more information. I found that relationship very interesting and he clearly felt strongly about it, even though he always tried to make himself seem detached.
Overall, very interesting book from the perspective of a man who dated some of the most beautiful women of the time. As a person, I'm not sure I think much of Vadim. He clearly had vision when it came to film making and helping these women become celebrities, but he seems emotionally detached from his relationships and was a serial adulterer (although I am an American so maybe his behavior was just normal for a Frenchman). He continued to paint this image of himself throughout the book that he was just a nice guy who liked to sleep with women, but was very responsible when it came to being a father. It may have been true that he was a better parent than, say Stroyberg, but I have to wonder what all of these women would say about Vadim's character behind closed doors, how he was as a husband and father. I also, quite frankly, just can't see the appeal. He seemed a bit sexist (although that was quite normal for the time). Maybe he was amazing in the sack.
I read somewhere that Jane Fonda's daughter claimed that Fonda was the love of his life, but I'm not so sure. I certainly didn't get that vibe from this book (there's also an interesting interview with Fonda & Vadim on the Merv Griffin show in 1967 you should watch). To me, I think Bardot was the love of his life and he was constantly trying to recreate that magic over and over again with his preceding blonde wives.
I was most interested in the Bardot part, and he did not disappoint. There are very few biographies on Bardot, so any information I can find is always helpful. He detailed their meeting and his involvement in her career and her life even after their divorce. Although I was very interested in the timeline and facts, his writing seemed to lack emotion. I would have liked to see a little more intimate details about their time together.
He surprisingly spoke quite a bit about Annette Stroyberg, his second wife, even though she is not mentioned in the book's title. I actually wished there would have been more pictures and more information. I found that relationship very interesting and he clearly felt strongly about it, even though he always tried to make himself seem detached.
Overall, very interesting book from the perspective of a man who dated some of the most beautiful women of the time. As a person, I'm not sure I think much of Vadim. He clearly had vision when it came to film making and helping these women become celebrities, but he seems emotionally detached from his relationships and was a serial adulterer (although I am an American so maybe his behavior was just normal for a Frenchman). He continued to paint this image of himself throughout the book that he was just a nice guy who liked to sleep with women, but was very responsible when it came to being a father. It may have been true that he was a better parent than, say Stroyberg, but I have to wonder what all of these women would say about Vadim's character behind closed doors, how he was as a husband and father. I also, quite frankly, just can't see the appeal. He seemed a bit sexist (although that was quite normal for the time). Maybe he was amazing in the sack.
I read somewhere that Jane Fonda's daughter claimed that Fonda was the love of his life, but I'm not so sure. I certainly didn't get that vibe from this book (there's also an interesting interview with Fonda & Vadim on the Merv Griffin show in 1967 you should watch). To me, I think Bardot was the love of his life and he was constantly trying to recreate that magic over and over again with his preceding blonde wives.
January 3, 2024
I picked this up to read to live vicariously. Rich people lead different lives than the rest of us. Is it better? I think not-- just more chaotic. They do get to spend some time in beautiful places like a beach in Malibu, San Tropez, Nice, Paris, and I envy the splendor they see. I was disappointed with Roger Vadim in that he never seemed to realize that when you get married part of the vows is to, "forsake all others." Why get married if you are going to be openly unfaithful and, "bring home conquests"? Then he seemed shocked when his wives started bedding others. Open relationships don't work, yet he kept thinking he could have his cake and eat it too. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results. It was enjoyable to read about his close relationship with his children.
July 25, 2021
Roger Vadim was a French director and screenwriter lucky enough to have relationships with some of the most beautiful women in the world.After reading his memoir,however, you ask yourself what these women ever saw in a man so obviously in love with himself.
March 18, 2024
A rather flat read despite the subject matter.i found a case of poor old me by the author.no sympathy from me,encouraging open relationships when surprised when it all goes wrong.more about the films and less bedroom antics would have perked this book up.
February 24, 2014
Somewhere in the middle of this book, Roger recounts an episode maybe from the 60's or 70's, when he was walking his two dogs on the beach, when he stumbled upon an apparently drugged up (my conclusion), unshaved Jack Nicholson holding an orange with tar stains resembling the shapes of continents, but with America missing. This prompts Jack to contemplate the nature of existence or non-existence. The scene continues for a few more weird surreal beats, and this book is worth reading because of those few passages alone.
I don't remember many details because I read it some years ago. I was born in the late eighties so by the time I got to puberty, Bardot, Deneuve and Fonda were old ladies, but I was introduced to the last one through the opening shots of Barbarella where she strips in zero gravity. I stumbled upon this book like Roger did on Jack, randomly, while looking for something to put me to sleep when I saw a picture of Jane Fonda on the cover.
It proved to be immensely entertaining, taking you on a trip from post-war France, to Hollywood in the sixties and seventies. It's a great ride. I'm just skimming through the index now, and it's like a list of A list stars from that era, with whom Roger and his wives interacted.
It sort of reminds me of the documentary about Robert Evans, the Paramount producer "The kid stays in the picture", which is based on a book of the same name, which I haven't read, but you might, if you're interested in these kinds of things.
I don't remember many details because I read it some years ago. I was born in the late eighties so by the time I got to puberty, Bardot, Deneuve and Fonda were old ladies, but I was introduced to the last one through the opening shots of Barbarella where she strips in zero gravity. I stumbled upon this book like Roger did on Jack, randomly, while looking for something to put me to sleep when I saw a picture of Jane Fonda on the cover.
It proved to be immensely entertaining, taking you on a trip from post-war France, to Hollywood in the sixties and seventies. It's a great ride. I'm just skimming through the index now, and it's like a list of A list stars from that era, with whom Roger and his wives interacted.
It sort of reminds me of the documentary about Robert Evans, the Paramount producer "The kid stays in the picture", which is based on a book of the same name, which I haven't read, but you might, if you're interested in these kinds of things.
January 1, 2020
First Read: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Second Read: 12/31/2019 - 4.5 Stars⭐⭐⭐⭐💫
I realy like this book. It had being at least 10 years since my first reading of it and a lot had change about my knowledge of these people. I can't said for sure all stories were true but I believe most of them were. Vadim didn't portray himself in the most favored light and neither his companions. All women were described by him IMO as human and goddesses, with flaws and great qualities. On my first read I didn't know a damn of who was who but after reading it I got to pay attention to their names on the media. And to be honest their portrayal was fair real. Brigitte Bardot still until these days as iconic and one of the most beautiful women in the world as before. Catherine Denevue I didn't hear much about her and Jane Fonda is one of the most talented actresses alive and a ferocious activist who just these year got arrested several times for fight her ideals. So I strongly believed that this book was more of a ode of Vadim to his muses, what can be noted by his boisterous narrative.
Second Read: 12/31/2019 - 4.5 Stars⭐⭐⭐⭐💫
I realy like this book. It had being at least 10 years since my first reading of it and a lot had change about my knowledge of these people. I can't said for sure all stories were true but I believe most of them were. Vadim didn't portray himself in the most favored light and neither his companions. All women were described by him IMO as human and goddesses, with flaws and great qualities. On my first read I didn't know a damn of who was who but after reading it I got to pay attention to their names on the media. And to be honest their portrayal was fair real. Brigitte Bardot still until these days as iconic and one of the most beautiful women in the world as before. Catherine Denevue I didn't hear much about her and Jane Fonda is one of the most talented actresses alive and a ferocious activist who just these year got arrested several times for fight her ideals. So I strongly believed that this book was more of a ode of Vadim to his muses, what can be noted by his boisterous narrative.
May 29, 2011
This book was quite interesting and revealed a lot of the three women's personal lives. In comparison to the others, Vadim definitely comes across as liking Catherine Deneuve the least. Her part (the main reason why I got it in the first place) is the shortest of the three and even afterwards whenever he mentions her he seems to criticize her behavior, whether it's towards their son Christian or the other men in her life.
Still, it's a fascinating portrayal of those women as well as the 50s/60s and the circle of people they surrounded themselves with.
Still, it's a fascinating portrayal of those women as well as the 50s/60s and the circle of people they surrounded themselves with.
October 14, 2008
Completely juicy! Although I don't know why Deneuve is still mad at Vadim for dishing. The details were interesting, and I sympathize with Deneuve. However, Roger Vadim and Brigitte Bardot's relationship was WAY juicier!! mmmm, mmmm. When I get over my disdain for Jane Fonda, I will have to read that secion of the book too. Denueve & Bardot sort of tided me over for a LOOOONG time.
December 2, 2018
Good gossip.
November 25, 2012
nice reading, of course. a lot of background histories. funny things (sad things too). Vadim, no doubt was one of the most lucky man in the all world. i mean, come on, bardot, deneuve and fonda?
July 30, 2016
Egy nagyon szerencsés ember titkai szerelmeiről és még jó is. Néha kicsit csapong, de meg lehet szokni.
December 20, 2016
I adored every moment of this memoir. Vadim seemed such a harmless, hapless, easy-going and romantic fellow. Quintessentially French. Many amazing and humorous stories. And Jane Fonda. SIGH.
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