In accepting the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the 2021 Golden Globes, Jane Fonda called for more inclusion in Hollywood’s storytelling. Fonda called out films and television shows with BIPOC cast and crew over the past year that have inspired her, including, Nomadland and Minari. She said Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and Judas and the Black Messiah “deepened my empathy for what being Black has meant.”
The veteran actor and longtime activist had previously urged the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. to diversify its membership by including Black members, days after an L.A. Times investigation revealed the 87-member awards group has none. Read below her full speech;
“Thank you all the members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. I’m so moved to receive this honor. Thank you.
“You know, we are a community of storytellers, aren’t we? And in turbulent, crisis-torn times like these, storytelling has always been essential. You see, stories have a way that — they can change our hearts and our minds; they can help us see each other in a new light, have empathy to recognize that for all our diversity, we are humans, first, right? I’ve seen a lot of diversity in my long life, and at times, I’ve been challenged to understand some of the people I’ve met. But inevitably, if my heart is open and I look beneath the surface I feel kinship.
“That’s why all of the great conduits of perception — Buddha, Muhammad, Jesus, Lao-Tzu, all of them spoke to us in stories and poetry and metaphor. Because the nonlinear, noncerebral forms that are art, speak on a different frequency. They generate a new energy that can jolt us open and penetrate our defenses, so that we can see and hear what we may have been afraid of seeing and hearing.
“Just this year, ‘Nomadland’ helped me feel love for the wanderers among us and ‘Minari’ opened my eyes to the experience of immigrants dealing with the realities of life in a new land, and ‘Judas and the Black Messiah,’ ‘Small Axe,’ ‘United States vs. Billie Holiday,’ ‘Ma Rainey’ and ‘One Night in Miami’ and others have deepened my empathy for what being Black has meant. ‘Ramy’ helped me feel what it means to be Muslim American.
“ ‘I May Destroy You’ has taught me to consider sexual violence in a whole new way. The documentary ‘All In’ reminds us how fragile our democracy is and inspires us to fight to preserve it, and ‘A Life on Our Planet’ shows us how fragile our small blue planet is and inspires us to save it and ourselves.
“Stories. They really can change people.
“But there’s a story we’ve been afraid to see and hear about ourselves in this industry. The story about which voices we respect and elevate and which we tune out. It’s about who’s offered a seat at the table and who was kept out of the rooms where decisions are made. So that’s all of us, including all the groups who decide who gets hired and what gets made and who wins awards. Let’s all of us make an effort to expand that tent, so that everyone rises and everyone’s story has a chance to be seen and heard.
“I mean, doing this simply means acknowledging what’s true, being in step with the emerging diversity that’s happening because of all those who marched and fought in the past and those who picked up the baton today. After all, art has always been not just in step with history but has led the way. So let’s be leaders. OK? Thank you. Thank you so much.
“And Happy Birthday, Tommy Tune!”
neillfrazer@hotmail.com
