Born on 4 May 1929 in Ixelles, a municipality in Brussels in Belgium, Audrey Hepburn is one of the worlds most famous actresses of all time. She is remembered as a film and fashion icon of the twentieth century. She is ranked, by the American Film Institute, as the third greatest female screen legend in the history of American cinema.
The part in the Breakfast at Tiffanys movie based on the novel of Truman Capote brought her worldwide recognition. As she said: I'm an introvert. Playing the extroverted girl was the hardest thing I ever did." But she did it perfectly well and became a fashion icon. The little black dress designed by Givenchy which she wore in the movie became truly iconic. Later the dress was sold at a Christie's auction on 5 December 2006 for 467,200 (approximately $920,000), almost seven times its 70,000 pre-sale estimate.
The designer created outfits for her for many other movies, including Funny Face, Love in the Afternoon, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Paris When It Sizzles, Charade and How to Steal a Million. Givenchy also created a perfume for her titled L'Interdit (French for "Forbidden"). She also popularized the Ray-Ban Wayfarer sunglasses which she wore in Breakfast at Tiffanys. In addition to the movie, she appeared in them on the covers of such famous magazines like Vogue and Harper's Bazaar.
After the carrier of an actress, she devoted a substantial part of her life to (United Nations Children's Fund). Since the 1950s she greatly contributed to the organization as she worked in the most disadvantaged communities of Africa, South America and Asia. In 1992, Hepburn was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of her work as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador but in 1993 she died of appendiceal cancer at her home in Switzerland, aged 63.
Hepburn's legacy as an actress and a personality has lasted years and years after her death. Even in her last years, she remained a visible presence in the film world. She has been the subject of many biographies since her death and the 2000 dramatisation of her life titled The Audrey Hepburn Story which starred Jennifer Love Hewitt and Emmy Rossum as the older and younger Hepburn respectively. The film concludes with footage of the real Audrey Hepburn, shot during one of her final missions for UNICEF.
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Belgian diva is widely used in advertising campaigns across the world. In the United States, Hepburn was featured in a Gap commercial which ran from 7 September 2006, to 5 October 2006. It used clips of her dancing from Funny Face, set to AC/DC's "Back in Black", with the tagline "It's Back The Skinny Black Pant". To celebrate its "Keep it Simple" campaign, the Gap made a sizeable donation to the Audrey Hepburn Children's Fund.
