If you want to prove to the world that you’re alive and well—thriving, even—then make an appearance at a high-profile funeral.
If tabloid inches are any indication, these once-somber affairs are now competing for attention with fashion weeks and Hollywood premieres. They even resemble social events, where guests make their mark in sophisticated outfits.
Last weekend in Milan, there was a public viewing for the fashion designer Giorgio Armani, who died at age 91 on September 4. Approximately 16,000 people visited his fashion brand’s Tadao Ando–designed theater, on Via Bergognone, to line up behind his wood coffin, including a sunglassed Donatella Versace, who left a bouquet of white flowers.
At Vivienne Westwood’s memorial service in London, in 2023, the paparazzi photos resembled street-style photography: Victoria Beckham in an angular sheath dress, Helena Bonham Carter in a flurry of checks, and Simon Le Bon in sharp tailoring. It was a similar scene at memorial services for the editor André Leon Talley, and more recently, the designers Claude Montana and Roberto Cavalli. Last July, Brigitte Macron attended the funeral of French anchorman Thierry Ardisson wearing black leather pants, a wink to the deceased’s love for rock music.
Diesel’s new advertising campaign covers the life of a character from birth to death, wearing (the right) jeans even in the coffin. Photos taken on the set of the Devil Wears Prada sequel suggest that Anne Hathaway’s character attends a stylish funeral in Central Park carrying an Empire 34 Coach bag.
The enthusiasm is even extending to final resting places. Mathieu Lehanneur, a designer known for the cauldron used during the Olympic Games in Paris, has created twin urns for his parents, even though they are alive and well. The Parisian artist Jean-René Tabouret is getting cheeky with marble memorial plaques. What, you wouldn’t want to be remembered for eternity alongside a contrarian statement like “shitty world” or “asshole”?
In fiction, funerals are often the perfect occasion to forge alliances and convey private messages. They represent the dawn of a new era, a passage from one generation to the next. No wonder they’re giving some social climbers FOMO. In France, Jack Lang, the 86-year-old former minister of culture, seems to frequent them as often as he goes out to dinner. He was spotted at services for the actresses Mireille Darc and Anouk Aimée, fashion designer Thierry Mugler, and the dancer Patrick Dupond.
The actor Montgomery Clift and friend, the singer Libby Holman, were notorious funeral crashers, known for using their fingers to eat out of the caviar bowls. On his Substack, the journalist Michael Isikoff recently reported that Oliver North, a member of President Reagan’s National Security Council and memorable player in the Iran-Contra affair, reconnected with Fawn Hall, his former secretary, last December at the memorial service for North’s wife of 56 years. “She rekindled the relationship at the funeral,” a friend of the couple told Isikoff. “They started spending time together.” They are now married.
But no funeral lover trumps Emmanuel Macron. Compared with his predecessors Nicolas Sarkozy and François Mitterand, each of whom organized four national tributes during their presidencies, Macron ordered that 32 services for a range of luminaries be designated national events. (This list includes the actors Jean-Paul Belmondo and Michel Bouquet, artist Pierre Soulages, and author Jean d’Ormesson.) And he looked completely dashing at every one.
Intriguingly, Macron’s college thesis concerned the Italian social philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli, who believed that public ceremonies such as funerals were powerful political tools. Maybe there’s a link here?
Katia Kulawick-Assante is a France-based writer
