To help the cause, ’70s activists asked Jane Fonda to focus more on her movie career
Civil rights activist Ken Cokrel encouraged Jane Fonda to use her platform as a Hollywood star to help the movement
Aux News Jane Fonda
Jane Fonda has had a long career in both movies and activism, but there was a time she was ready to give up one for the other. In a new profile with The Hollywood Reporter, Fonda recalls being encouraged by fellow activists in the ’70s to put more focus on her film career—in service of the cause.
The actor explains that civil rights activist Ken Cockrel was the one who talked her out of quitting Hollywood. “He said, ‘Fonda, we have a lot of organizers. We don’t have movie stars in the movement,’” she shares. “‘You not only should not quit, you should pay more attention to your career. Be more intentional about your movies and what you make.’ ”
As we know, Fonda stuck it out and ultimately formed a production company, where she produced films like Vietnam war flick Coming Home, the anti-sexism classic 9 To 5, and The China Syndrome, about the nuclear power industry. But these days, she doesn’t have any more message-movies in her, at least not as a producer: “I never could get anything made quickly,” she tells THR. “The fastest was Coming Home, which I think was five and a half years. I don’t have that kind of time now.”
And she’s still having the debate about whether she should drop acting for good, though it sounds like she ultimately ends up reaching the same conclusion. “I recently thought, ‘Maybe I do want to quit acting.’ I mean, I’m 85. But then I realized, my platform matters. It brings people in that might not come in normally.”
As Fonda said, “One feeds the other.” Her activism work taught her to become a feminist after a childhood of internalizing misogyny, and now she makes film and television that celebrates women and their relationships. “By opening myself to feminism and to women’s friendships, I’ve become a much healthier person,” she says. “It’s taught me to not be afraid of vulnerability, not be afraid to ask for help, even though it’s really hard for me to do that.”
29 Comments
Her being 85 years old is wild to me. I’ve never encountered an 85 year old ever who has anything resembling the level of energy on display in the 80 For Brady trailer. I’m not saying it’s false it’s just…. shocking.Did she get bit by a vampire or find the fountain of youth or something? My gosh.
Not a swipe at her personally, but it helps to be ungodly rich and unburdened with many of the life stressors the rest of us face.
i mean, she just got over cancer, but ok
I saw her sitting outside at a resort hotel a couple weeks ago in CA. Would not have guessed she was 85. I mean, she wasn’t running around the place or anything and was sitting and bundled up, but still more with it than most 85-yr olds i’ve encountered.
Maybe eternal youth was the price for her soul when she was an American traitor.
That’s a lovely wax statue of Jane Fonda, but couldn’t they just use a picture of her?
hey fuck you
Ahh The China Syndrome: One of the reasons we still use fossil fuel power plants instead of the far cleaner and healthier nuclear power plants that we should have built since 1979. Brilliant!
The best/worst part? The film came out like a week before Three Mile Island. What timing, and yeah, its a shame.
I saw that, amazing timing right there.
You forgot ridiculously expensive and needing multiple decades to complete.
Ehh… doesn’t need decades any longer to build.
And yet still a far better solution than fossil fuels all the way around.
That’s like saying anything tastes better than actual shit.But at least you are technically correct, the best kind of correct.
I feel like there are probably things that taste worse than actual shit but I’m also not willing to google that or experiment for SCIENCE! myself, so I won’t argue.
For me the funniest thing is her playing a patriots fan. Hanoi Jane a patriot what a joke
The Vietnam War was an absolute atrocity top to bottom. The only moral position was to oppose it. Every U.S. soldier was complicit in a genocide.
hey fuck you
Distantly recall a late 90’s Soldier Of Fortune (or some shit) magazine with the cover story “Hanoi Jane: The Case For Treason”, still pissed off after like 25 years.
In the early 2000s the college I attended hosted a film festival and presented her with a lifetime achievement award. For the week before and the week after there was this one guy walking all over town with a “Shame on Hanoi Jane” sign.
Haha yea I remember shit like that. Those types really took that shit personally for fucking decades. They acted as if she flew to Hanoi and gave everyone there blow jobs.
Can you imagine a picture of Margo Robbie, Jennifer Lawrence or Zoe Saldana sitting at a table eating lunch with Russian Troops? That would be the modern equivalent of Jane Fonda touring Hanoi. Veterans and their families have a right to be upset with her. She was a stupid propaganda tool at a time when too many American troops were dying for a political win that never should have been fought.
I wouldn’t say that’s the equivalent since we don’t have troops actively engaged in that theater, but I get your point. Hanoi Jane’s actions resulted directly in the deaths of American soldiers. She was, is, and will always remain a traitor.
The Vietnam War was an absolute atrocity top to bottom. The only moral position was to oppose it. Every U.S. soldier was complicit in a genocide. Those veterans have blood on their hands.
I hope you’re familiar with what is called a “Draft”? Plenty of those soldiers were sent over without a choice and under the threat of imprisonment. Your position is admirable in a vacuum but that wasn’t the case for most.No war fought throughout history can be thought of as “moral”.
1). Opposing the war through any means was still the moral decision.2). Plenty of ways to avoid the draft, like going to jail or Canada. I personally would rather rot in jail than be a pawn for a genocidal empire.
Thats a terrible analogy. Last I checked, not a single US soilder ever fought in Russia or against Russians. The entire Vietnam War was stupid and pointless, & the US treated it’s troops like cannon fodder. Be mad over that. Holding a 40 yr personal grudge against some movie star is just misplaced anger.
“Nazi veterans and their families have a right to be upset with this celebrity who did anti-Nazi propaganda”
She’s been a useful idiot for decades now.