Jane Birkin was born in London, she is the daughter of the beautiful actress Judy Campbell and David Birkin, an officer in the Royal Navy, who worked on clandestine operations as navigator with the French Resistance. She first went on stage at the age of 17 and met John Barry, the composer. 1965 she had been chosen to play in a musical comedy "Passion Flower Hotel". Music signed... John Barry ! They married shortly afterwards, and Kate Barry was born in 1967. 

At the age of twenty, Jane attracted attention in "Blow-up", Antonioni's scandalous film that received the grand prix at the Cannes Film Festival. In France, Pierre Grimblat was filming Slogan and was looking for a girl to play opposite Serge Gainsbourg. The artist was already famous and was still grieving after his break up with Brigitte Bardot. Jane went for a screen test; she barely spoke French, knew nothing about her co-star, Gainsbourg gave the young girl a rough time, but when she burst into tears, mixing private sadness about John Barry and the film part, he disapproved, but he recognised that she cried well in front of the camera, and he, who could of vetoed the directors choice, agreed with him, and Jane got the part! And that was how their mythical love story began in Paris in 1969. They became inseparable and a living legend when they recorded "Je t'aime moi non plus". Censorship went wild, the Vatican banned it, the B.B.C refused to play the original, and did their own orchestral version, thanks to this the record sold a million copies in a matter of months! Off they went to Yugoslavia to play in Abraham Polonski's "Romance of a horse thief" with Yul Brynner and Eli Wallach... nine months later their daughter Charlotte was born, in 1971.

 

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