In City of Light, Bruni a Bright Bulb Indeed

Who could have imagined that Italian supermodel-singer Carla Bruni would find love with a right-wing French president? Maureen Orth takes a look at France’s First Lady in Vanity Fair: her education in art and architecture, admiration of women's-libbers Simone de Beauvoir and Françoise Sagan, and her husband's reaction to nude pictures online. ("Oh, I like this one! Can I have a print of it?")

“They are hunters who met—predators,” said Karl Lagerfeld of Bruni and Nicolas Sarkozy. “When two like this meet, it can be good.” But Bruni, famed for her naughtiness as well as her smarts, has "fascinating" taste in men. "I have never seen a man fawn over Carla," said one insider. "She chooses her equal.” (More Carla Bruni stories.)