The Producers Guild of America (PGA) announced today that producer/actress Jane Fonda will be honored with the Guild’s 2019 Stanley Kramer Award. Established in 2002, the award honors a production, producer or other individuals whose achievement or contribution illuminates and raises public awareness of important social issues. Fonda is being recognized for her lifetime activism and philanthropic work, and will receive the award at the 30th Annual Producers Guild Awards presented by Cadillac on January 19, 2019 at The Beverly Hilton hotel in Los Angeles.
Two- time Academy Award® winner Jane Fonda is known equally for her achievements in entertainment and for her prolific work in support of many political and social causes. Among them include her nonprofit, the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Power & Potential, for which she celebrated her 80th birthday last December by raising $1.3 million to lower the teen pregnancy rate and improve the overall health and well-being of young people in the state of Georgia. In the same month, Fonda raised nearly $1 million for the Women’s Media Center, a nonprofit she co-founded with Gloria Steinem and Robin Morgan, whose mission is to make women and girls more visible and powerful in media. Earlier this year, Fonda starred in the summer box office hit, “Book Club”; and was the subject of the critically-acclaimed HBO documentary, “Jane Fonda in Five Acts,” chronicling her life and her activism. Next month, the fifth season of her Netflix show “Grace and Frankie,” which she executive produces and stars, will debut.
Said PGA Presidents Gail Berman and Lucy Fisher, “Jane Fonda has built an extraordinary legacy as an outspoken advocate for the vulnerable in our society. Throughout her remarkable life, she has made and continues to make a significant impact on the lives of people through her work both on and off the screen. Fonda exemplifies the spirit of Stanley Kramer, and we are proud to honor her.”
Previous recipients of the Stanley Kramer Award include: “Get Out,” “The Hunting Ground,” “The Normal Heart,” “Fruitvale Station,” “Precious,” "An Inconvenient Truth,” and “Hotel Rwanda.” The award is named for producer/director Stanley Kramer, the celebrated filmmaker who wove progressive social themes into his films and made a positive cultural impact on the audiences of his time. He created some of the most powerful works in the history of American motion pictures, including such classics as “Inherit the Wind,” “On the Beach,” “The Defiant Ones,” and “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.” The Stanley Kramer Award is determined by a nine-person committee appointed by the PGA’s National Board of Directors and operates independently of the Producers Guild Awards team and the PGA staff.
ABOUT JANE FONDA
Jane Fonda was born in New York City in 1937, the daughter of Henry Fonda and Frances Seymour Fonda. She attended the Emma Willard School in Troy, New York, and Vassar College. In her early twenties, Fonda studied with renowned acting coach Lee Strasberg and became a member of the Actors Studio in New York.
Fonda is a two- time Academy Award® winner (Best Actress in 1971 for “Klute” and in 1978 for “Coming Home”), a three-time Golden Globe® winner, and was the 2014 recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award. Along with starring roles in dozens of highly acclaimed productions, Fonda also took on responsibilities as a film and television producer. Her credits include “Coming Home,” “The China Syndrome,” “Nine to Five,” “Rollover,” “On Golden Pond,” “The Morning After” and “The Dollmaker.”
In 2007 Fonda received an Honorary Palme d’Or from the Cannes Film Festival, one of only three people ever to be granted this honor until then. In 2009 she received a Tony Award nomination for her role in Moisés Kaufman’s “33 Variations,” on Broadway.
Fonda revolutionized the fitness industry with the release of “Jane Fonda’s Workout” in 1982. She followed with the production of 23 home exercise videos, 13 audio recordings, and seven bestselling books – selling 17 million copies all together. The original “Jane Fonda’s Workout” video remains the top grossing home video of all time.
In 2011, Fonda appeared in “Et Si On Vivait Tous Ensemble,” a French comedy, followed by “Peace, Love & Misunderstanding,” co-starring Catherine Keener. She appeared as Nancy Reagan in “Lee Daniels’s The Butler” in 2013, and with Olivia Wilde and Sam Rockwell in “Better Living Through Chemistry.” In 2014, she starred in director Shawn Levy’s “This is Where I Leave You,” with Tina Fey and Jason Bateman. For three seasons Fonda appeared as media mogul Leona Lansing in an Emmy nominated performance in Aaron Sorkin’s “The Newsroom,” on HBO. Most recently, she appeared in “Youth,” written and directed by Paolo Sorrentino. She received a Golden Globe nomination for her performance.
Fonda also stars in Netflix’s hit series, “Grace and Frankie,” which premiered its fourth season in January 2018. She received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for the 2017 Emmys. In fall 2017 her film, “Our Souls at Night,” co-starring Robert Redford premiered on Netflix. The co-stars were honored with Golden Lions for Lifetime Achievement in September 2017 at the 74th Venice Film Festival. Fonda also premiered “Jane Fonda in Five Acts,” a documentary chronicling her life and her activism, at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival. She was most recently seen on the big screen in Paramount’s comedy, “Book Club,” in which she stars alongside Diane Keaton, Mary Steenburgen, and Candice Bergen.
About THE PRODUCERS GUILD OF AMERICA (PGA)
The Producers Guild of America is a non-profit trade organization which protects and promotes the interests of all members of the producing team in film, television and new media. Representing more than 8,000 producers, the PGA works to safeguard the careers of its members and improve the producing community at large by encouraging the enforcement of workplace labor laws and sustainable production practices, creating fair and impartial standards for the awarding of producing credits, facilitating health benefits for its membership, and hosting educational opportunities for new and experienced producers alike.
