Did you enjoy that experience?
I absolutely loved it! I could feel myself sinking down into that character—and that was my first Oscar nomination, too! I don’t quite do that anymore, but whenever I felt like I could go deep and lose myself in a part, that was what I enjoyed the most. That’s what I craved.
In terms of career trajectory, They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? feels like the start of a big shift in terms of the films you started making in the ’70s. The more famous you got, the more you leaned into making grittier, more socially conscious films like Klute, Coming Home, The China Syndrome, and so on.
I had a friend and mentor in Detroit [Ken Cockrel Sr.] who was a lawyer and really helped me understand what organizing looks like. I would go out with United Auto Worker organizers and just watch them work. In 1971 I told Ken that I was quitting acting to become an organizer. He just looked at me and said, “Fonda, the movement has plenty of organizers, but we don’t have movie stars. What you need to do is focus on your career, because the movies you make are what give you a platform.” I really took that to heart and went on to start a production company where I developed movies about topics that I really cared about, starting with Coming Home.
I’m assuming that’s how a film like 9 to 5 was born? It’s so outrageously fun, but at its core it’s a film about labor rights.
9 to 5 came about because I had a friend whose day job was organizing female office workers. She would tell me all these stories and I just thought, I’ve gotta make this into a movie. Then I met Lily Tomlin and thought, Well, it’s gotta be a comedy so she can be in it. I discovered that if there’s something you want to say, you have to find the best container for the message. 9 to 5 is a comedy, Coming Home is a drama with a love story at the center, and The China Syndrome is a thriller. If people are enjoying a movie, the message will enter their subconscious by osmosis because they’re so caught up in the comedy or the romance.
