Carla Bruni-Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa (born Carla Gilberta Bruni Tedeschi; Italian pronunciation:[ˈkarladʒilˈbɛrtaˈbruːniteˈdeski]; 23 December 1967) is an Italian and French[3] singer, songwriter and fashion model who served as the first lady of France from 2008—when she married then president Nicolas Sarkozy—to 2012.
She was born in Italy and moved to France at the age of seven. Bruni was a model from 1987 to 1997 before taking up a career in music. She wrote several songs for Julien Clerc that were featured on his 2000 album, Si j'étais elle. Bruni released her first album, Quelqu'un m'a dit, in 2003, which eventually spent 34 weeks in the top 10 of the French Albums Chart. Bruni won the Victoire Award for Female Artist of the Year at the 2004 Victoires de la Musique. The same year, Bruni released her second album, No Promises, then the following year, she released her third album, Comme si de rien n'était. In 2013, Bruni released her fourth album, Little French Songs. In 2017, Bruni released her fifth album, French Touch. In 2024, she walked in the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show.
Early life and family
Bruni was born in Turin, Italy. She is legally the daughter of Italian concert pianist Marisa Borini and industrialist and classical composer Alberto Bruni Tedeschi.[4] In 2008, however, Bruni told Vanity Fair that her biological father is Maurizio Remmert, a classical guitarist who comes from a wealthy family. When Remmert met Marisa Borini at a concert in Turin, he was a 19-year-old classical guitarist, and their affair lasted six years.[5] Her sister is actress and movie director Valeria Bruni Tedeschi. She had a brother, Virginio Bruni Tedeschi (1959 – 4 July 2006), who died from complications of HIV/AIDS.[6] Her (legal) paternal grandparents and her maternal grandfather were Italian, while the last quarter of her ancestry is French.[7] She is second cousin of Alessandra Martines.[8][9]
Bruni is an heiress to the fortune created by the Italian tire manufacturing company CEAT, founded in the 1920s by her legal grandfather, Virginio Bruni Tedeschi. The company was sold in the 1970s to Pirelli (the brand continues in its former subsidiary in India, founded in 1958).[10] The family moved to France in 1975,[5] purportedly to escape the threat of kidnapping by the Red Brigades, a Communistterrorist group active in Italy in the 1970s and 1980s. Bruni grew up in France from the age of seven and attended the finishing school Château Mont-Choisi in Lausanne, Switzerland. She went to Paris to study art and architecture, but left school at 19 to become a model.[11] By her biological father, Bruni has a half-sister, Consuelo Remmert.[12]
In 1997, Bruni quit the world of fashion to devote herself to music.[5] She sent her lyrics to Julien Clerc in 1999, based on which he composed six tracks on his 2000 album Si j'étais elle.[16]
In 2003, her debut album Quelqu'un m'a dit, produced by Louis Bertignac and released in Europe, was a surprise hit, selling 2 million copies.[16] Three songs from the album appear in Hans Canosa's 2005 American film Conversations with Other Women,[17] the song Le Plus Beau du quartier was used in H&M's Christmas 2006 commercial, and the title track was featured in the 2003 movie Le Divorce[18] and in the 2009 movie (500) Days of Summer.[19] In January 2010, her song "L'amoureuse" was featured in an episode of NBC's Chuck, "Chuck vs. First Class".[20]
In 2005, she wrote the lyrics for 10 out of 12 songs for Louis Bertignac's new album Longtemps, and performed two duets with him on the album, Les Frôleuses and Sans toi.[21]
2006–2008: No Promises and Comme si de rien n'était
She continued recording after her marriage. She released her third album Comme si de rien n'était on 11 July 2008. The songs are self-penned except for one rendition of "You Belong to Me" and another song featuring Michel Houellebecq's poem La Possibilité d'une île set to music.[22] Royalties from the album will be donated to unidentified charitable and humanitarian causes.[23]
2009–present: Little French Songs, return to modelling, and other projects
Following months of speculation, in a television interview broadcast on 23 November 2009, Bruni revealed that she had accepted a role in a forthcoming Woody Allen film. She admitted her reasoning for embarking on the Paris production; "I'm not an actress at all. Perhaps I'll be completely hopeless, but I can't miss an opportunity like this one. When I'm a grandmother I'd like to be able to say I made a film with Woody Allen."[27][28]
Italian singer/songwriter Simone Cristicchi's entry in the 2010 San Remo Italian Song Festival was the song "Meno Male", with the chorus lyrics of "Meno male che c'è Carla Bruni" ("Thank goodness for Carla Bruni"). The song appears to mock Bruni and her husband, but Cristicchi stated in an interview for Italian television weekly TV Sorrisi e Canzoni "I use sarcasm to explain our Italian way of always wanting to follow any type of gossip without being interested in real problems."[30] Bruni was to be a guest singer at the 2010 San Remo festival, but withdrew from participating.[31]
Following Bruni's marriage to President Nicolas Sarkozy on 2 February 2008, she moved into the Élysée Palace for the remainder of Sarkozy's five-year term. Bruni was given an office on the east wing of the palace, which was known as "Madame's wing" and was assigned a private secretary.[38]
Although constitutionally, Bruni had no official role within the government, she assisted her husband with a number of official obligations. She also accompanied Sarkozy on state visits, most notably, to the United Kingdom, where her presence led to the visit being widely publicized.[39] Bruni also accompanied Sarkozy on a state visit to meet the Dalai Lama in August 2008.[40]
In 2010, Forbes magazine ranked Bruni as the 35th-most powerful woman in the world.[44]
Personal life
Political views
Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni leaving the Elysee Palace, 15 May 2012
During the 2007 French presidential election, Bruni stated that she would have voted for Ségolène Royal, who was running against her future husband, Nicolas Sarkozy. Bruni said her lack of French citizenship disallowed her from voting, but she would have voted left-wing due to it being a family tradition.[45] In an October 2011 interview with the British newspaper The Sunday Herald, Bruni said, "My family have always voted to the left. It's tradition. I'll never vote right wing."[46]
In an interview with Le Point, Bruni said, when asked about her political leanings, "I am left wing, but I'm not against my husband or his party. I am not an activist." In a May 2011 interview with Le Parisien, Bruni said she no longer felt left-wing and identified as an ultra-Sarkozyist.[47]
In a 2012 Vogue magazine interview, Bruni stated, "My generation doesn't need feminism ... I'm not at all an active feminist. On the contrary, I'm bourgeois."[48] On 16 November 2020, she told BBC Radio Five Live: "Of course I'm a feminist, like every woman is" and "My husband is very much a feminist man." She also said that she was "not at all a political person."[49]
In 2012, she stated that she supports same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption.[50][51]
Relationship with the Enthovens
In 2001, Bruni had her first child, son Aurélien, with philosophy professor Raphaël Enthoven. Bruni has been described as having been the mistress of Enthoven's father, journalist Jean-Paul Enthoven, when she began her relationship with the younger Enthoven, who was at the time married to novelist Justine Lévy; Bruni claims that she only went out with Jean-Paul Enthoven a few times and was never his lover, and that Raphaël Enthoven was already divorcing his wife when she encountered him months after last seeing Jean-Paul.[5]
The song "Raphaël" from Bruni's album Quelqu'un m'a dit is about her relationship with Raphaël Enthoven, and Justine Lévy's 2004 book Rien de Grave (published in English in 2005 as Nothing Serious) is about the end of her marriage; a character named "Paula" represents Bruni.[5][52] Bruni told Vanity Fair that Raphaël Enthoven ended their relationship in May 2007 because he felt they had become "like friends", and that they remained on good terms.[5]
Bruni met the recently divorced French president Nicolas Sarkozy in November 2007, at a dinner party.[53] After a brief romance, they married on 2 February 2008 at the Élysée Palace in Paris. The marriage is Bruni's first and Sarkozy's third. Bruni acquired French nationality by naturalization on 10 December 2008.[54][55] She has since made contradictory statements as to whether she still holds Italian nationality, as well.[56] On 28 April 2014 episode of the Ellen DeGeneres Show, she confirmed that she still holds Italian citizenship.[57]
Following her marriage to Sarkozy, in February 2008, Bruni continued accompanying him on state visits, including to the United Kingdom in March 2008, which created a sensation in the international press and for the public in both Britain and France.[58] As First Lady, she had an office and staff at her disposal in the East wing of the Élysée Palace.[59]
Controversy arose on the eve of the state visit to the UK, with the publication by Christie's auction house of a nude photograph of Bruni taken during her career as a model. The photograph sold for $91,000.[60] Also, great interest began in Bruni's wardrobe, which was Christian Dior, seen as a diplomatic choice, since Dior is a French design house, but the wardrobe was designed by John Galliano, a British designer working for Dior.[61] Another controversy was the use of a popular photo of the French President and Bruni in the print advertising of Ryanair. The couple was awarded damages[why?] by a French court.[62]
In December 2008, Bruni sued the makers of a bag featuring a nude shot taken during her youth[when?]. Clothes designer Pardon produced 10,000 of the shopping bags emblazoned with the nude photo taken in 1993, showing Bruni staring at the camera with her crossed hands covering her crotch.[63]
On 19 October 2011, Bruni gave birth to a daughter, Giulia, in the Clinique de la Muette, in Paris.[64]
Witness tampering
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On 9 July 2024, Bruni-Sarkozy was put on bail after being charged with having put pressure on a witness who accused ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy of having received illegal campaign financing from Libya.[65]
She was suspected of being involved in bribing Lebanese judicial personnel.[66]
^"Legends". models.com. Carla Bruni - Few can claim to have been an all-star top model, first lady of France and a full-fledged chanteuse, but Carla Bruni is a force like none other. As a model, Bruni's compelling elegance made her a favourite of designers who embrace classism with an edge. Though she now splits her time between music and philanthropic work, Bruni resurfaces every so often for a choice campaign or cover - like her ongoing stint as the face of Bulgari, or turn guest editing Vogue Paris.
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