Jane Fonda HBO Documentary to Air This September | Playbill

Film & TV News Jane Fonda HBO Documentary to Air This September Jane Fonda in Five Acts will chronicle the life story of the two-time Tony nominee and Oscar winner.
Jane Fonda Joseph Marzullo/WENN

Jane Fonda in Five Acts, a new documentary from HBO, will premiere September 24.

//assets.playbill.com/editorial/5d210ab8f2407df3fd11a5d2b73bcc4c-there-was-a-little-girl-joey-heatherton-jane-fonda-broadway-production-photo-jane-fonda-hr.jpg
Joey Heatherton and Jane Fonda in There Was a Little Girl Friedman-Abeles/©NYPL for the Performing Arts

Produced by documentarian Susan Lacy (American Masters, Spielberg), the film examines the life of Fonda—an actor, workout maven, producer, activist, and author. Culled from 21 hours of interviews with Fonda and conversations with family, friends, and collaborators—including Lily Tomlin, Robert Redford, and Ted Turner—Fonda “explores the pain of her mother's suicide, her father’s emotional unavailability, 30 years of an eating disorder, and three marriages to highly visible, yet diametrically opposed, men.”

Fonda made her Broadway debut in 1960 as Toni Newton in the Daniel Taradash play There Was a Little Girl, for which she was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in Play, and quickly followed that up appearing in Invitation to a March (1960), The Fun Couple (1962), and Stranger Interlude (1963). It was around that time that Fonda began making movies, notably Barefoot in the Park (1967) and Barbarella (1968), where she met her first husband director Roger Vadim. In 1969, she received her first Oscar nomination for They Shoot Horses, Don”t They?. In 1971, she gained her first win with an Oscar for Klute. She won her second Oscar for Coming Home and has a total of seven Academy Award nominations, 15 Golden Globe nominations (seven wins), five Emmy nominations (one win), and six BAFTA nominations (two wins).

READ: DID YOU KNOW JANE FONDA EARNED A TONY NOMINATION FOR HER BROADWAY DEBUT?

//assets.playbill.com/editorial/20617e174ee2a4254d632aa54496a7a9-33variations-grenierfonda-hr.jpg
Zach Grenier and Jane Fonda in 33 Variations. Joan Marcus

She came to fame as a fitness guru with her exercise tapes, the first of which came out in 1982. Constantly returning to the screen over her decades-long career—and currently starring in Netflix’s Grace & Frankie—Fonda returned to the stage in 33 Variations in 2009 and earned a second Tony nomination for her performance.

Over the years, Fonda has been vocal for feminist causes, anti-war movements, environmental consciousness, and more. She published an autobiography My Life So Far in 2005 and, in 2001, Prime Time: Love, health, sex, fitness, friendship, spirit — making the most of your life. She advocates for adolescent reproductive health and emotional education of future generations.

The film from HBO Documentary Films is produced and directed by Lacy, produced by Emma Pildes and Jessica Levin, edited by Benjamin Gray, co-edited by Kris Liem, with director of photography Sam Painter, and music by Paul Cantelon.

 
Latest News
 X

Blocking belongs
on the stage,
not on websites.

Our website is made possible by
displaying online advertisements to our visitors.

Please consider supporting us by
whitelisting playbill.com with your ad blocker.
Thank you!