Jane Fonda didn’t think she’d see another Sunday in New York.
The actress, 87, recently opened up about why she felt she would die young.
“I didn’t think I’d live past 30,” Fonda admitted while on Michelle Obama’s “The Look” podcast on Wednesday. “I was sure I was going to die.”
The “Book Club” alum added that her “youth was not especially happy.”
“I’m not addictive, but I thought I was going to die from drugs and loneliness,” revealed Fonda, referring to losing her mother, Frances Ford Seymour, when she was just 12 years old. “So the fact that I’m almost 88 is astonishing to me.”
Despite what the workout guru went through in the past, she has no regrets.
“I wouldn’t go back for anything,” Fonda stated. “I feel more centered, more whole, more complete. I’m very happy single.”
The activist also shared her personal philosophy on growing older, noting that it’s “never” been something she feared.
“More importantly, I’m not afraid of dying,” Fonda confessed. “The most important thing I did was when I was going to turn 60, and in my mind … this is the beginning of my final act, and I didn’t know how to live it.”
However, the actress addressed what she does fear.
“I watched my dad die with a lot of regrets,” recounted the Oscar winner about the late actor Henry Fonda. “That was an important realization for me, because if you don’t want to die with regrets, then you have to live the last part of your life in such a way that there won’t be any regrets.”
Fonda continued: “I also want to be surrounded by people who love me. … Forgiveness comes into play, including forgiving myself. That actually has guided me in the last 30 years. I’ve been living to not have regrets.”
“I think that old age is fantastic if it’s lived intentionally,” she told Obama, 61. “Intentionality is the key. Really thinking about it.”
Fonda expressed her philosophy on taking care of herself physically and mentally as she ages.
“I’m controversial, and I’m an activist, and I’ve been very unpopular,” she said. “I’m popular right now. It probably won’t last, but I think that it’s important for somebody like me — who’s an activist — to show that I can also look good and then I’m still hirable. It encourages the young ones to not be so afraid.”
In February, Fonda received the Lifetime Achievement Award during the 2025 SAG Awards.
During her speech, the star took a walk down memory lane.
“Your enthusiasm makes this seem like a twilight of my life and more like a, ‘Go girl, kick ass!’ Which is good because I’m not done,” Fonda gushed.
“I have had a really weird career — totally, not as my agents there at that table will tell you, totally unstrategic. I retired for a few years and then I came back at 65,” she recounted, “which is not usual, and then I made one of my most successful movies in my 80s and probably in my 90s I’ll be doing my own stunts in an action movie. Have you ever heard the phrase, ‘It’s OK to be a late bloomer as long as you don’t miss the flower show’? I’m a late bloomer. This is the flower show.”
“I love acting,” Fonda continued. “We get to open people’s minds to new ideas and help them laugh when things are tough — like now. And for a woman like me who grew up in the 40s and 50s when women weren’t supposed to have opinions and get angry, acting gave me a chance to play angry women with opinions.”
At the time, Fonda also said she’s “a big believer in unions” including SAG-AFTRA.
“What we create is empathy. Our job is to understand another human being so profoundly that we can touch their souls. We feel their joy.”
Fonda first made her film debut in the 1960 comedy “Tall Story.”
She starred in several hit movies, such as “Fun with Dick and Jane,” “9 to 5,” Julia” and “The Morning After.”
After her 15-year acting break she returned with “Monster-in-Law” in 2005.
Fonda won the Best Actress Oscars for “Klute” in 1972 and “Coming Home” in 1979..
The humanitarian has been a vocal advocate for social causes since the ’60s.
Fonda was married three times in her life. She tied the knot with Roger Vadim (1968-1973), Tom Hayden (1973-1990) and Ted Turner (1991-2001).
The Hollywood vet shares daughter Vanessa, 57, with the late Vadim, son Troy, 52, with the late Hayden.
Fonda also has one adoptive daughter, Mary Luana, 58.
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