During one of her most recent interviews, timed for International Women's Day in March, she spoke candidly with actress Brie Larson about her life. Published on net-a-porter.com, Fonda acknowledged she'd been sexually abused as a child and fired from jobs because she "wouldn't sleep with the boss".
But she told Larson she thought it was terrifying to be a young actress today: "You have to get naked so much. There is even more emphasis on how you look … If you look at Bette Davis, Barbara Stanwyck and Mae West, they were sexy and strong but they didn't necessarily expose anything. They were adored for it."
Early in her acting career, Fonda was known as a sex symbol partly because her naked body appeared on a giant billboard to promote the 1964 film Circle of Love and the surreptitious sale of nude photos, from another movie set, to Playboy. That reputation was cemented when Fonda appeared in her then husband Roger Vadim's film Barbarella playing a sexually-liberated space traveller.
In the far-ranging discussion with Larson, the 80-year-old admitted she didn't become a feminist until seeing the play The Vagina Monologues in the late 1990s. Fonda told Larson that sexual harassment has become "an epidemic", that everyone has the right to speak up no matter whether they're famous or not and that those with a profile can reach into areas that politics cannot.
Born in 1937, Fonda's parents were Canadian socialite Frances Ford Brokaw and movie-star Henry Fonda. She was quick to follow her father into show business, teaching dance from the age of 15 and appearing alongside Henry in a 1954 benefit concert.
After a brief modelling career — Fonda was a Vogue cover girl in 1959 and 60 — she moved into acting, averaging two films a year during the 1960s but was soon to become arguably as famous for activism as acting.
In the late 1960s, Fonda joined protests against the Vietnam War which led to a 1972 visit to Hanoi where she was controversially photographed sitting on a North Vietnamese Army anti-aircraft gun.
While she later claimed the photograph was a set-up, this and comments made during the visit earned her the ire of a swathe of the American public. She was dubbed "Hanoi Jane" and, as late as 2005, was still dealing with the fallout when a former US soldier reportedly spat chewing tobacco in her visit during a book signing event. Fonda has repeatedly said she apologises for hurt she may have caused but told Larson that, at the time, she didn't care if it ended her career.
"I didn't become an activist until I was 31. When I found out what was really happening in Vietnam I didn't care if I ever worked again; I considered leaving the business to become a full-time activist. My father was terrified for me. He remembered the '50s when people's careers were destroyed. It's possible the [Hollywood] blacklist will be brought back."
Despite the backlash, her activism didn't hinder Fonda's career. Williams says between her explosive Vietnam War protests of the late '60s, her one-woman fitness video revolution of the '80s and her tireless work for women's health and representation, the civil rights activist and prolific author has never been defined by one job.
A two-time Academy Award Best Actress winner, Fonda made movies into the 1990s when she retired from acting. However, she returned to the screen in 2005 and has continued making film and television appearances, most notably in the Netflix series Grace and Frankie and the film, released this month, Book Club.
Lowdown:
What: An Evening with Jane Fonda
Where & when: ASB Theatre, Aotea Centre; Thursday, August 30
Presales begin on Tuesday; general ticket sales from Monday, June 18 starting at $99.
