May 14, 2006

THEY say that “life is a journey, not the destination”, and Jane Fonda’s autobiography My Life So Far is a journey through her life — a fascinating, surprising journey, brought vividly to life by Fonda herself.

Holding a mirror to her past and present life, My Life So Far is Jane Fonda’s detailed and quite personal examination of her life, covering her troubled childhood as the unconfident daughter of Henry Fonda, her successful acting career, her controversial political activism against the Vietnam War, her workout videos bringing about a revolution in the fitness industry, her advocacy of women’s rights and her current life. She is not just an Oscar-winning actress; Fonda is a complex personality whose life has so many dimensions that it is difficult to understand her.

Jane Fonda was born to the acting legend Henry Fonda and socialite Frances Seymour. Despite her privileged birth, her early years are marked by profound sadness: her mother’s suicide when she was 12, her father’s emotionally distant attitude, her parents’ troubled marriage and her personal struggle to find her way in the world as a young woman. It was either because of this or some other reason that she continually felt inadequate all through her life and has struggled with feelings of insufficiency and co-dependency.

She was obsessed with the idea of having a perfect body since her teenage years and spent almost 30 years of her life struggling with anorexia and bulimia — disorders that she acquired in her quest for thinness.

In 1958, Fonda was introduced by her father to renowned drama teacher Lee Strasberg and joined his Actors’ Studio. Her screen debut came in 1960 in the film “Tall Story”. Initially, she was cast in frivolous roles in romantic comedies like “Period of Adjustment” (1962), “Sunday in New York” (1963) and “Barefoot in the Park” (1967). She gained repute as a serious actress in “They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?” (1969), which earned her the best actress Oscar nomination, and then as a call-girl in “Klute” (1971) for which she won her first Oscar. During the ’70s, she sought variety and challenge and appeared in serious roles in “A Doll’s House” (1973) and “Julia” (1977), which was also nominated for an Oscar, etc. She won her second Oscar as the wife of a Vietnam vet in “Coming Home” (1978).

Fonda also formed her own production company, and starred in films such as “The China Syndrome” (1979), another Oscar-nominated movie, “9 to 5” (1980), and “On Golden Pond” (1981), which was the only movie in which she co-starred with her father. She played memorable roles in the TV drama “The Doll Maker” (1984), which won her an Emmy, an investigative reporter in “Agnes of God” (1985), a murder suspect in “The Morning After” (1986, Oscar-nominated) and “Stanley and Iris” (1990). In 1991, after her marriage to Ted Turner, she announced her retirement from acting but returned to the screen in 2005 in the comedy “Monster-in-Law”. She gave up her retirement briefly in 2001 when she performed in “The Vagina Monologues”.

During the late ‘60s, she got interested in politics and engaged in political activism in support of the Civil Rights movement and against the Vietnam War. She supported the Alcatraz island occupation in 1969, which was intended to call attention to the native American issue. She also supported the Black Panthers, a nationalist US organisation, in the early ’70s.

At a rally organised by Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) in Pennsylvania, Fonda spoke out against the war. She volunteered to help raise funds for VVAW and, for her efforts, was rewarded with the title of Honorary National Coordinator. In 1970, Fonda toured college campuses to raise funds for the organisation.

Jane visited Hanoi in July 1972; there she tried to expose the bombing of the dikes and also participated in several radio broadcasts on behalf of the Communist regime, asking US aircrews to turn around without dropping their bombs, and was photographed seated on an anti-aircraft battery used against American aircrews. Later, she said that she was manipulated into sitting on the battery, for she had immediately realised the implication of the pictures. She also visited American prisoners of war (Pows), who she claims were neither tortured nor brainwashed. For her antiwar activism, she was nicknamed “Hanoi Jane”.

In 1972, Fonda funded and organised the Indo-China peace campaign that continued to mobilise antiwar activists across the nation even after the 1973 Paris Peace Agreement, when most other antiwar organisations had closed down.

In the ’80s and ’90s, she promoted physical fitness through a series of popular books and video tapes. In 1978, while filming “The China Syndrome”, she fractured her foot and was unable to practice ballet, which she regularly did as a means of staying in shape. Thus, she began exercise classes. This became a passion and second career for her, which continued for many years. In 1982, she released her first exercise video titled “Jane Fonda’s Workout”, which sold 17 million copies and is the biggest-selling home video of all time. She subsequently released 23 more workout videos, five workout books and 13 audiotapes.

Fonda has been a long-time supporter of feminist causes, including V-Day, a movement to stop violence against women, inspired by the play “The Vagina Monologues” by Eve Ensler. In 1995, she funded the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention (G-Capp), which she chairs and in 2001 opened the Jane Fonda Centre for Adolescent Reproductive Health at the Emory University School of Medicine with the goal to prevent adolescent pregnancy and to promote women’s reproductive rights by empowering young girls and women. She believes that women be given importance in all issues and not left in the background as “Women are the issue — the core issue. They are the majority of humanity, whose rights are human rights.”

Jane Fonda divides her life into three acts, each 30 years long — she expects to live till the age of 90. The first act entitled “Gathering” delves deeply into her troubled yet privileged childhood, her relationship with her parents, her mother’s suicide and how all that affected her as a young woman and as a budding actress, her first marriage to director Roger Vadim, and ends with her role in the classic “Barbarella”.

The second act called “Seeking” deals with her growing career in films, her tormented life with Roger Vadim and subsequent divorce, and a change in her outlook and subsequent marriage to Ted Turner. It also showcases her marriage to politician Tom Hayden, her political activism and involvement with the Vietnam War and the workout videos that revolutionised the exercise and diet industry. A significant chapter in this act is the filming of Academy Award winning “On Garden Pond” with her father Henry Fonda.

The very brief third act entitled “Beginning” discusses how she felt when she turned 60, her reflections on mortality and what her legacy may be, and her current life. Here, she hopes to “begin living consciously” in a way that might inspire others who can learn from her experiences. Fonda’s quest for self-discovery makes her say: “I don’t want to die without knowing who I am.” She declares that her third act will be her most significant, and that it will determine the things she will be remembered for.