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Henry Jaynes Fonda (May 16, 1905 – August 12, 1982) was a highly acclaimed
Academy Award-winning American film and stage actor, best known for his roles as
plain-speaking idealists. Fonda's subtle, naturalistic acting style preceded by
many years the popularization of method acting.
Fonda made his mark early as a Broadway actor, and made his Hollywood debut in
1935. Fonda's career gained momentum after his Academy Award-nominated performance
in 1940's The Grapes of Wrath, an adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel about an
Oklahoma family who moved west during the Dust Bowl. Throughout six decades in
Hollywood, Fonda cultivated a strong, appealing screen image in such classics as
The Ox-Bow Incident, Mister Roberts, and 12 Angry Men. Later, Fonda moved toward
both more challenging, darker epics as Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West
(as a villain who kills, among others, a child and a cripple) and lighter roles in
family comedies like Yours, Mine and Ours (with Lucille Ball).
He was the patriarch of a family of famous actors, including daughter Jane Fonda,
son Peter Fonda, granddaughter Bridget Fonda, and grandson Troy Garity.
In 1999, he was named the sixth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film
Institute.
He was usually called "Hank" by family and close friends.
 Life and
career
Fonda was born in Grand Island, Nebraska to
advertising-printing jobber William Brace Fonda and Herberta Krueger Jaynes,
in the second year of their marriage.
The Fonda family had emigrated westward from New York in the 1800s, and traces its
ancestry from Genoa, Italy to The Netherlands in the 1500s, and then to the United
States of America in the 1600s, settling in the town now called Fonda, New
York.
As a youth in Nebraska, Fonda was active in the Boy Scouts of America and was a
Scoutmaster, but was not an Eagle Scout as some report. Fonda related the story in
his autobiography that his father had taken him to see the aftermath of a lynching.
This so enraged the young Fonda that a keen social awareness of prejudice was
present within him for his entire adult life. He then attended the University of
Minnesota, majoring in journalism, although he did not graduate.
At age twenty, he started his acting career at the Omaha Community Playhouse when
his mother's friend Dodie Brando (mother of Marlon Brando) needed a young man to
play the lead in You and I. He went east to perform with the Provincetown Players
and Joshua Logan's University Players, an intercollegiate summer stock company,
where he worked with Margaret Sullavan, his future wife, and began a lifelong
friendship with James Stewart.
Early
career
Fonda and Stewart headed for New York City, where the two were roommates and honed
their skills on Broadway. Fonda appeared in theatrical productions from 1926 to
1934, and made his first film appearance (1935) as the leading man in 20th Century
Fox's screen adaptation of The Farmer Takes a Wife, reprising his role from the
Broadway production of the same name. In 1935 Fonda starred in the RKO film I Dream
Too Much with the famous opera star Lily Pons.
Fonda's film career blossomed as he costarred with Sylvia Sidney and Fred MacMurray
in The Trail of the Lonesome Pine (1936), the first Technicolor movie filmed
outdoors. Fonda also got the nod for the lead role in You Only Live Once (1937),
also costarring Sidney, and directed by Fritz Lang. A critical success opposite
Bette Davis in the film Jezebel (1938) was followed by the title role in Young Mr.
Lincoln and his first collaboration with director John Ford.
Fonda's successes led Ford to recruit him to play "Tom Joad" in the film version of
John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath (1940), but a reluctant Darryl Zanuck,
who preferred Tyrone Power, insisted on Fonda's signing a seven-year contract with
the studio, Twentieth Century-Fox. Fonda agreed, and was ultimately nominated for
an Academy Award for his work in the 1940 film, which many consider to be his
finest role, but he was edged out by Stewart, who won the award for his role in The
Philadelphia Story.
World War II
service
Fonda played opposite Barbara Stanwyck in The Lady Eve (1941), and was acclaimed
for his role in The Ox-Bow Incident. The following year he played opposite Gene
Tierney in the screwball comedy Rings on Her Fingers (1942), but he then enlisted
in the Navy to fight in World War II, saying, "I don't want to be in a fake war in
a studio."
Previously, he and Stewart had helped raise funds for the defense of Britain from
the Nazis. Fonda served for three years, initially as a Quartermaster 3rd Class on
the destroyer USS Satterlee. He was later commissioned as a Lieutenant Junior Grade
in Air Combat Intelligence in the Central Pacific and won a Presidential Citation
and the Bronze Star.
Post-war
career
After the war, Fonda appeared in the film Fort Apache (1948), and his contract with
Fox expired. Refusing another long-term studio contract, Fonda returned to
Broadway, wearing his own officer's cap to originate the title role in Mister
Roberts, a comedy about the Navy. He won a 1948 Tony Award for the part, and later
reprised his performance in the national tour and the 1955 film version opposite
James Cagney, William Powell and Jack Lemmon, continuing a pattern of bringing his
acclaimed stage roles to life on the big screen. On the set of Mister Roberts,
Fonda came to blows with John Ford and vowed never to work for him again. He never
did (though he appeared in Peter Bogdanovich's acclaimed documentary Directed by
John Ford and spoke glowingly of Ford therein).
Career in the
1950s and 1960s
Fonda followed Mr. Roberts with Paramount Pictures's production of the Leo Tolstoy
epic War and Peace, in which Fonda played Pierre Bezukhov opposite Audrey Hepburn.
Fonda worked with Alfred Hitchcock in 1956, playing a man falsely accused of murder
in The Wrong Man.
In 1957, Fonda made his first foray into production with 12 Angry Men, based on a
script by Reginald Rose and directed by Sidney Lumet. The intense film about twelve
jurors deciding the fate of a young man accused of murder was well-received by
critics worldwide. Fonda shared the Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations with
co-producer Reginald Rose and won the 1958 BAFTA Award for Best Actor for his
performance as the logical "Juror #8." However, Fonda vowed that he would never
ever produce a movie again. After western movies The Tin Star (1957) and Warlock
(1959), Fonda returned to the production seat for the NBC western television series
The Deputy (1959–1961), in which he also starred.
The 1960s saw Fonda perform in a number of war and western epics, including 1962's
The Longest Day and How the West Was Won, 1965's In Harm's Way and Battle of the
Bulge, and the Cold War suspense film Fail-Safe (1964), about a possible nuclear
holocaust. He also returned to more light-hearted cinema in Spencer's Mountain
(1963), which was the inspiration for the TV series, The Waltons.
He appeared against type as the villain "Frank" in 1968's Once Upon a Time in the
West. After initially turning down the role, he was convinced to accept it by actor
Eli Wallach and director Sergio Leone, who flew from Italy to the United States to
persuade him to take the part. Fonda had planned on wearing a pair of brown-colored
contact lenses, but Leone preferred the paradox of contrasting close-up shots of
Fonda's innocent-looking blue eyes with the vicious personality of the character
Fonda played.
Fonda's relationship with Jimmy Stewart survived their disagreements over politics
— Fonda was a liberal Democrat, and Stewart a Republican. After a heated argument,
they avoided talking politics with each other. In 1970, Fonda and Stewart costarred
in the western The Cheyenne Social Club, a minor film in which the two humorously
argued politics. They had first appeared together on film in On Our Merry Way
(1948), a comedy which also starred William Demarest and Fred MacMurray and
featured a grown-up Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer.
Late
career
Despite approaching his seventies, Henry Fonda continued to work in both television
and film through the 1970s. In 1970, Fonda appeared in three films, the most
successful of these ventures being The Cheyenne Social Club. The other two films
were Too Late the Hero, in which Fonda played a secondary role, and There Was a
Crooked Man, about Paris Pitman Jr. (played by Kirk Douglas) trying to escape from
an Arizona prison.
Fonda made a return to both foreign and television productions, which provided
career sustenance through a decade in which many aging screen actors suffered
waning careers. He starred in the ABC television series The Smith Family between
1971 and 1972. 1973's TV-movie The Red Pony, an adaptation of John Steinbeck's
novel, earned Fonda an Emmy nomination. After the unsuccessful Hollywood melodrama,
Ash Wednesday, he filmed three Italian productions released in 1973 and 1974. The
most successful of these, My Name Is Nobody, presented Fonda in a rare comedic
performance as an old gunslinger whose plans to retire are dampened by a "fan" of
sorts.
Henry Fonda continued stage acting throughout his last years, including several
demanding roles in Broadway plays. He returned to Broadway in 1974 for the
biographical drama, Clarence Darrow, for which he was nominated for a Tony Award.
Fonda's health had been deteriorating for years, but his first outward symptoms
occurred after a performance of the play in April 1974, when he collapsed from
exhaustion. After the appearance of a heart arrhythmia brought on by prostate
cancer, a pacemaker was installed following surgery and Fonda returned to the play
in 1975. After the run of a 1978 play, First Monday of October, he took the advice
of his doctors and quit plays, though he continued to star in films and
television.
In 1976, Fonda appeared in several notable television productions, the first being
Collision Course, the story of the volatile relationship between President Harry
Truman (E.G. Marshall) and General MacArthur (Fonda), produced by ABC. After an
appearance in the acclaimed Showtime broadcast of Almos' a Man, based on a story by
Richard Wright, he starred in the epic NBC miniseries Captains and Kings, based on
Taylor Caldwell's novel. Three years later, he appeared in ABC's Roots: The Next
Generations, but the miniseries was overshadowed by its predecessor, Roots. Also in
1976, Fonda starred in the World War II blockbuster Midway.
Fonda finished the 1970s in a number of disaster films. The first of these was the
1977 Italian killer octopus thriller Tentacoli (Tentacles) and the mediocre
Rollercoaster, in which Fonda appeared with Richard Widmark and a young Helen Hunt.
He performed once again with Widmark, Olivia de Havilland, Fred MacMurray, and José
Ferrer in the killer bee action film The Swarm. He also acted in the global
disaster film Meteor, with Sean Connery, Natalie Wood and Karl Malden, and then the
Canadian production City on Fire, which also featured Shelley Winters and Ava
Gardner.
As Fonda's health continued to suffer and he took longer breaks between filming,
critics began to take notice of his extensive body of work. In 1979, the Tony
Awards committee gave Fonda a special award for his achievements on Broadway.
Lifetime Achievement awards from the Golden Globes and Academy Awards followed in
1980 and 1981, respectively.
Fonda continued to act into the early 1980s, though all but one of the productions
he was featured in before his death were for television. These television works
included the critically acclaimed live performance of Preston Jones' The Oldest
Living Graduate, the Emmy nominated Gideon's Trumpet (co-starring Fay Wray in her
last performance), and 1981's Summer Solstice, which teamed Fonda with the
legendary Myrna Loy for the first time. This was the last film on which Henry Fonda
worked, and work began on it following the release of the movie adaptation of
Ernest Thompson's play On Golden Pond.
This film, directed by Mark Rydell, provided unprecedented collaborations between
Fonda, Katharine Hepburn, and Fonda's daughter, Jane. When premiered in December
1981, the film was well received by critics, and after a limited release on
December 4 On Golden Pond developed enough of an audience to be widely released on
January 22. With eleven Academy Award nominations, the film earned nearly $120
million at the box office, becoming an unexpected blockbuster. In addition to wins
for Hepburn (Best Actress), and Thompson (Screenplay), On Golden Pond brought Fonda
his only Oscar for Best Actor (it also earned him a Golden Globe Best Actor award).
After Fonda's death, some film critics called this performance "his last and
greatest role".
Marriages and
children
Henry Fonda was married five times. His marriage to Margaret Sullavan in 1931 soon
ended in separation, which was finalized in a 1933 divorce. In 1936, he married
Frances Ford Seymour. They had two children, Peter and Jane. In 1950, Seymour
committed suicide. Fonda married Susan Blanchard, the stepdaughter of Oscar
Hammerstein II, in 1950. Together, they adopted a daughter, Amy (born 1953), but
divorced three years later. In 1957 Fonda married Italian Countess Afdera
Franchetti. They remained married until 1961. Soon after Fonda married Shirlee Mae
Adams, and remained with her until his death in 1982.
His relationship with his children has been described as "emotionally distant". In
Peter Fonda's 1998 autobiography Don't Tell Dad, he described how he was never sure
how his father felt about him, and that he did not tell his father he loved him
until his father was elderly and he finally heard the words, "I love you, son". His
daughter Jane rejected her father's friendships with Republican actors such as John
Wayne and Jimmy Stewart, and as a result, their relationship was extremely
strained.
Jane Fonda also reported feeling detached from her father, especially during her
early acting career. Henry Fonda introduced her to Lee Strasberg, who became her
acting teacher, and as she developed as an actress using the techniques of "The
Method," she found herself frustrated and unable to understand her father's
effortless acting style. In the late 1950s, when she asked him how he prepared
before going on stage, he baffled her by answering, "I don’t know, I stand there, I
think about my wife, Afdera, I don't know."
Writer Al Aronowitz, while working on a profile of Jane Fonda for The Saturday
Evening Post in the 1960s, asked Henry Fonda about Method acting: "I can't
articulate about the Method," he told me, "because I never studied it. I don't mean
to suggest that I have any feelings one way or the other about it...I don't know
what the Method is and I don’t care what the Method is. Everybody's got a method.
Everybody can’t articulate about their method, and I can't, if I have a method—and
Jane sometimes says that I use the Method, that is, the capital letter Method,
without being aware of it. Maybe I do; it doesn’t matter."
Fonda's daughter shared this view: "My father can't articulate the way he works."
Jane said. "He just can't do it. He's not even conscious of what he does, and it
made him nervous for me to try to articulate what I was trying to do. And I sensed
that immediately, so we did very little talking about it...he said, 'Shut up, I
don't want to hear about it.’ He didn’t want me to tell him about it, you know. He
wanted to make fun of it."
Fonda himself once admitted in an interview that he felt he wasn't a good father to
his children. In the same interview, he explained that he did his best to stay out
of the way of Jane and Peter's careers, citing that he felt it was important to
them to know that they succeeded because they worked hard and not because they used
his fame to achieve their goals.
Death and
legacy
Fonda died at his Los Angeles home on August 12, 1982, at the age of 77 from heart
disease. Fonda's wife Shirlee and daughter Jane were at his side when he died. He
also suffered from prostate cancer, but this did not directly cause his death and
was only mentioned as a concurrent ailment on his death certificate.
In the years since his death, his career has been held in even higher regard than
during his life. He is widely recognized as one of the Hollywood greats of the
classic era. On the centenary of his birth, May 16, 2005, Turner Classic Movies
honored him with a marathon of his films. Also in May 2005, the United States Post
Office released a thirty-seven-cent postage stamp with an artist's drawing of Fonda
as part of their "Hollywood legends" series.
Filmography
From the beginning of Henry Fonda's career in 1935 through his last projects in
1981, Fonda appeared in 106 films, television programs, and shorts. Through the
course of his career he appeared in many critically acclaimed films, including such
classics as 12 Angry Men and The Ox-Bow Incident. He was nominated for an Academy
Award for Best Actor for his role in 1940's The Grapes of Wrath and won for his
part in 1981's On Golden Pond. Fonda made his mark in westerns and war films, and
made frequent appearances in both television and foreign productions late in his
career.
Source : Some of the information on this page came
from a Wikipedia article and is licensed under the GNU Documentation
License. ©2008 www.geneticmatrix.com.
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Henry
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