Jane Fonda and her Life of Struggles
Jane Fonda says she understood the meaning of life twenty years ago. And today, at the age of eighty-five, she is spreading the secret of what she is living as a life full of struggles: from feminism to environmentalism, she doesn’t stop anymore. Actually yes, the Oscar winner takes a year and a half break from cinema to dedicate herself to the American presidential campaign next year: she wants a leader who sweeps away the corrupt ruling class and who believes in a green world.
Jane Fonda’s Love for Italy
Meanwhile we find Jane Fonda in the room with Book Club – The Next Chapter, which she shot in Italy. And from here the starting point to talk about Italy and much more … What do you like about Italy? “It was love at first sight when I lived on the Appian Way in Rome to shoot Barbarella. This time I spent two and a half months in the city center, taking walks in Villa Borghese and Villa Medici. And then pasta and ice cream are synonymous with happiness. I would move there forever, if it weren’t for the terrible bureaucracy”. What else do you remember about Barbarella? “The set was surreal: they tied us between our legs to a mechanical arm connected to the green screen to pretend to fly in space and the metal rope was so tight that I thought it would make me sterile.“
Jane Fonda’s Activism and Elixirs of Youth
With her blonde hair, she became the darling of Hollywood, how did it make her feel? “I consider myself a tom-boy and as a child I didn’t want to be female, but those hairs gave me a sense of security and femininity that I didn’t feel. But one day I went to the hairdresser and cut them all: what a relief!” How did she become an activist? “After the stories of Vietnam veterans and their wives, but I couldn’t do much because I was living in Paris, so I left my first husband Roger Vadim and returned to my country, where I was arrested several times”. And then? “I felt more useful organizing protests than acting and I told one of the colleagues of the various campaigns that I was about to leave Hollywood. He dissuaded me by saying that they could find other secretaries but there was no other movie star who was involved in that way.” In her life of critical moments she has lived many, yet she tells them with serenity, how does she do it? “Mom committed suicide when I was young and at one point I thought of doing it too, to feel close to her, but then the fiction of being someone else on the set made me change my mind.” Why, among all the emergencies, does the climate crisis particularly affect her? “Because we are doomed if we don’t change course. We have to take back power, however, protests are not enough.” Do you have any regrets? “The plastic surgery I had done years ago. I’m not proud of it.” What is your elixir of youth today? “Last night, for example, I slept 13 hours, I have a healthy life, I exercise and then I carry my miraculous make-up artist with me, but more than anything else to make the difference is my curious nature.” What is your idea of healthy politics? “Before Covid-19 I spent a lot of time knocking on the doors of Donald Trump supporters because you have to listen to those who don’t agree with you. For me politics must be inclusive and not sectarian, welcoming and protecting.”
