Vadim’s movie Round (1964), according to Arthur Schnitzler, is by no means imperishable. “A number of Parisian life reviewed and corrected by a model maker from Playboy », quotes Jean de Baroncelli in The world. But Jane Fonda appears naked, a first for an American actress in a foreign film. A scandal in the land of Puritanism, especially when his photo, lying on a sheet, appears in Times Square, New York. Vadim pretends to be dismayed and Jane files a complaint. The croup will be covered with a white square of a perfect bad taste.
Jane is in love. She married Roger Vadim Plemiannikov on August 14, 1965 at The Dunes casino in Las Vegas. A decision made in 24 hours: Jane, out of respect for her father, prefers to formalize their relationship. The couple did it again for the French civil status, on May 18, 1967, at the town hall of Saint-Ouen-Marchefroy (Eure-et-Loir), 50 kilometers from Paris. The actress bought in 1964 an old farmhouse in the village. To the amazement of the hamlet, she planted already adult trees there: to transport them, the telephone pylons had to be dismantled. “They cost less than evening dresses. And they last a lifetime.” she justifies in the magazine Time. Jane repopulates the farm: eight dogs, ten cats, chickens, a pony. She invites Americans passing through France to dine. She renovates, makes lists, organizes kitchen and staff. “She does everything very seriously, relates Vadim. To the letter. »
Brigitte Bardot’s ex-husband and father of Catherine Deneuve’s son has convinced Jane that the salvation of marriage lies in ecumenism. “Vadim says it very well himself, explains Jane, always Time, in 1966. You have a mistress, you bring her flowers twice a year: she is delighted. Forgot your wife’s birthday? It’s a drama. People change after marriage. They become very bourgeois. » Vadim likes threesomes, or even more. Jane lends herself to antics, convinced that she is not enough for her husband, this master of transgression. “I never dared to tell him that I wanted him to be monogamous; I was afraid of appearing bourgeois,” she reveals in her autobiography, My life (Plon, 2005). He even happens to play the touts for the evening. In the morning, she chats with the girls, who come from high-end houses like Madame Claude. “It’s not like he forced me to do it. I could have refused”, she notes. But Vadim has understood the motivation of women who hate their bodies, he is well aware of the ocean of insecurity in which Jane drowned.
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