Project Inspiring View of Future
Jane Fonda may be 87, but she’s not about to slow down any time soon.
The two-time Oscar winner, who received the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award at the 2025 SAG Awards, said she saw the honor and the enthusiastic reception she received from the Hollywood stars in the audience, who gave her a standing ovation, as more of a “go-girl kick-ass” form of encouragement instead of something being given to someone toward the end of their life.
“Which is good because I’m not done,” Fonda said.
During her speech, Fonda looked back on her “really weird” acting career — including roles in Klute, Coming Home, Barbarella, 9 to 5, Grace and Frankie, Monster in Law, The Newsroom, 80 for Brady and Book Club and its sequel — and expressed support for the opportunities given to her onscreen.
“Acting gave me a chance to play angry women with opinions,” she said of the early days of her career when having such a persona offscreen wasn’t seen as acceptable. “I’m a big believer in unions — they have our backs. They bring us into community and they give us power. Community means power. This is really important right now when workers’ power is being attacked and community is being weakened.”
Then, as presenter Julia Louis-Dreyfus indicated when she said it was hard to separate Fonda’s work as an actress from her activism, Fonda segued into how the empathy that actors use in their craft should inform their response to the current political climate.
“A whole lot of people are going to be hurt by what is happening, by what is coming our way,” Fonda said without mentioning specific policies, issues or people she was referring to as being responsible for this “serious” threat. “We need to listen with our hearts and not judge. We are going to need a big tent to resist successfully what is coming at us.”
And she took a moment to note, amid the Trump administration’s frequent opposition to “woke” initiatives, that “empathy is not weak or woke, and, by the way, woke just means you give a damn about other people.” That remark earned Fonda some of her loudest applause and cheers.
Fonda went on to wonder aloud if her fellow actors had watched documentaries about significant social movements and wondered if they would’ve participated in the activism.
“We are in our documentary moment. This is it, and it’s not a rehearsal,” she said. “And we musn’t for a moment kid ourselves about what is happening. This is big-time serious. … We must not isolate. We must stay in community. We must help the vulnerable. We must find ways to project an inspiring view of the future.”
Earlier, Louis-Dreyfus highlighted Fonda’s 65-year career, taking a moment to repeat and marvel at that longevity.
Calling Fonda “daring, controversial, truthful,” Louis-Dreyfus also poked fun at her ongoing vigor.
“She never stops. I’m telling you it’s freaky and it’s exhausting,” Louis-Dreyfus said. “The woman is 87, for the love of God, slow down, Jane, you’re all making us look like shit!”
The 2025 SAG Awards, hosted by Kristen Bell, is streaming live on Netflix from Los Angeles’ Shrine Auditorium.
More to come.
Source link
