Candice Bergen has spent decades on television screens. She’s been a model, a movie star, a five-time Emmy winner, and one of the most recognizable faces in American entertainment. And when critics come for her, she has never been the type to shrink.
These days, she’s living life entirely on her own terms — and she has a message for anyone who has a problem with it.
From Vogue Model to Murphy Brown Icon
Bergen began her career as a model, working for magazines like Vogue before transitioning into acting. Her breakout role came with Murphy Brown, the groundbreaking sitcom that made her a household name and earned her five Emmy Awards.
But that iconic role almost didn’t happen — at least not with her. Bergen has revealed that the part was originally intended for a younger actress, namely Heather Locklear. It was writer and producer Diane English who insisted Bergen was the one for the role.
Bergen has fond memories of the character. “That character gave me permission to be my brattiest, bawdiest self,” she once said. She was nominated for seven Emmys for the role and won five.
Then, after her fifth win, she made a surprising decision: she asked not to be considered for an Emmy again. Her priorities had changed. She had decided to live her life differently.
“I Am Fat. I Live to Eat.”
In her memoir, A Fine Romance, Bergen opened up about her relationship with food, her body, and aging — with a level of honesty that is rare in Hollywood.
She revealed that over the previous 15 years, she had gained about 30 pounds. And she didn’t care.
“Let me just come right out and say it: I am fat. I live to eat,” she wrote. “None of this ‘eats to live’ stuff for me.”
She described enjoying decadent meals at dinner parties with her husband, occasionally catching smug looks from other guests — and paying them no mind.
“I am a champion eater,” she wrote. “No carb is safe — no fat, either.”
Opting Out of the Youth Obsession
Bergen also reflected on how women in their 50s often become consumed by the effort to maintain their youth, sometimes forgetting to enjoy the lives they’re actually living. She chose a different path.
While her friends focused on diets, Bergen focused on food.
“Dieting is out of my purview,” she wrote. “I crave cookies, all the things that dilate my pupils.”
She also spoke out strongly against women she knew who maintained their figures by routinely purging after meals. “They maintain their weight by routinely vomiting after major meals consisting of a slice of steak or a filet of fish,” she wrote. “I am incapable of this.”
For Bergen, that wasn’t a virtue to celebrate — it was a line she simply would not cross.
A Life Beyond the Screen
Today, Bergen is in the second stage of her life: as a mother and grandmother. Her first marriage, to French director Louis Malle, lasted 15 years and ended with his death from cancer in 1995. Together they had a daughter, Chloe Malle. She later married Marshall Rose in the 2000s, and that marriage is still going strong.
She is now a grandmother to two grandchildren. Her grandson, Arthur Louis Albert, was born in 2020, and her granddaughter, Alice Malle Albert, followed in April 2022.
Bergen has spoken publicly about the joy she feels watching her daughter become a mother. “She is the love of my life,” she said of Chloe.
She shares sweet moments from her life on social media, and she is clearly smitten with being a grandmother to two toddlers.
Living Life on Her Own Terms
Candice Bergen has spent a lifetime in the public eye — and she has finally reached a place where the opinions of strangers simply don’t carry weight anymore. She eats what she wants. She says what she thinks. She loves her family fiercely. And she has absolutely no interest in pretending to be someone she’s not.
After decades of entertaining millions, Bergen has earned the right to live exactly as she pleases. And she’s doing it — one decadent meal at a time. ❤️
