There are few people for whom the word “icon” seems such a natural fit as for Jane Birkin — international actress, singer, former partner and collaborator of the late Serge Gainsbourg, namesake of the Hermès “Birkin bag” — but Birkin herself doesn’t agree.
“People exaggerate when they say ‘fashion icon.’ Even the word ‘icon.’ I don’t merit that in reality,” she tells us on this episode of Soul Sisters. “I think I’ve done about ten good films where I was all right, and some more than all right. But for the ones that most people know, like Blow-Up or Agatha Christie films, I was nothing in them,” she insists.
What she is mightily proud of, and in fact calls “the best thing I’ve ever done,” is her latest album, Birkin/Gainsbourg: Le Symphonique, on which she interprets some of the great songs written by the revered French artist. (Birkin and Gainsbourg are parents to Charlotte Gainsbourg, a previous Soul Sister and someone her mother differentiates herself from as “an actress right from the word go,” with “her own statement to make.”)
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Noting that she is currently performing in cities and venues Gainsbourg himself was never able to play in (“he was very short-lived as a live artist”), Birkin is proud to extend his legacy in this way.
And as for her own legacy? “I was a sort of jolly actress that suddenly did a bit better than people imagined in dramatic things,” she says with utterly convincing humility. “It’s not self-depreciating. It’s, I think, very lucid. And I mean, if you’re known for a bag, then what can I say.”
Listen to the full episode below, hosted by Jessie Katz and Darah Golub, and be sure to subscribe to the Soul Sisters iTunes channel for all future episodes!