Jane Fonda says she “can’t cease crying” as she mourns the loss of life of Robert Redford, her longtime display screen companion and fellow environmental activist. The influential filmmaker-actor who based the Sundance Institute died Tuesday at age 89.
“He meant so much to me and was a stupendous particular person in each manner. He stood for an America we have now to maintain combating for,” Fonda stated in an announcement to The Occasions. She shared the display screen with Redford in a number of movies, together with “The Chase” and “Barefoot within the Park.”
Fonda is among the many Hollywood figures grieving the lack of Redford and paying tribute to his lasting contributions to the movie panorama, on- and off-screen. Publicist Cindi Berger confirmed to The Occasions that Redford died at his residence at Sundance in Utah, ”the place he cherished, surrounded by these he cherished.”
On social media, Oscar winners Ron Howard and Marlee Matlin spoke about how Redford’s Sundance Institute and its movie pageant lengthy held in Park Metropolis, Utah, opened the doorways for generations of filmmakers. Howard tweeted on X that Redford was a “tremendously influential cultural determine” who based a pageant that “supercharged America’s Unbiased Movie motion.”
In different phrases, an “inventive gamechanger,” Howard wrote.
For Matlin, the historic success of her 2021 movie “CODA” may be traced again to the Sundance Movie Pageant and Redford. “Our movie, ‘CODA,’ got here to the eye of of everybody due to Sundance. And Sundance occurred due to Robert Redford,” she wrote.
“CODA,” directed by Sian Heder and starring Matlin, Troy Kotsur, Emilia Jones and Daniel Durant, took residence three Academy Awards in 2022, together with one of the best image prize. The movie was the primary greatest image winner to return out of Sundance since its founding within the Eighties, in keeping with distributor Apple.
Oscar-nominated actor Elizabeth McGovern, who started her display screen profession in Redford’s “Extraordinary Individuals,” reminisced on that chance in an announcement shared with The Occasions.
“Robert Redford gave me my first job in ‘Extraordinary Individuals,’ setting a excessive bar by way of a subsequent profession. His intelligence, empathy and understanding, not solely as a filmmaker, but in addition as an individual have been troublesome to match,” she stated. “After we shot ‘Extraordinary Individuals,’ he did my scenes on the weekend in order that I may attend the Juilliard Faculty throughout the week. This was the sort of caring particular person he was. I revered him then; I revere him now.”
Barbra Streisand, who starred reverse Redford in “The Means We Had been,” recalled on Instagram that she and her co-star “have been such opposites” however “stored looking for out extra about one another, identical to the characters within the film.”
“Bob was charismatic, clever, intense, all the time attention-grabbing — and one of many best actors ever,” she wrote. “He was one among a form and I’m so grateful to have had the chance to work with him.”
Oscar winner Morgan Freeman, who starred with Redford within the 1980 drama “Brubaker” and the 2005 drama “An Unfinished Life,” recalled sparking a friendship with the icon on set and stated on X that working with him the second time round “was a dream come true.”
For “Quiz Present” star Ralph Fiennes, Redford was a affected person and sort director who had a “droll humorousness as he guided me via display screen performing abilities and course of,” the actor stated in an announcement to The Occasions.
“I treasure my expertise working with him, which was additionally an introduction to an amazing filmmaker with a real inventive imaginative and prescient of an American cinema that may very well be clever, authentic and politically provocative,” Fiennes stated. He added that “the filmmaking world is smaller with out him.”
Actors Antonio Banderas, Ethan Hawke and Rita Wilson shared their tributes on social media. To “Ache and Glory” star Banderas, Redford was “an icon of cinema in each sense” with expertise that “will proceed to maneuver us ceaselessly, shining via the frames and in our reminiscence.”
Hawke and Wilson, of their respective statements, lauded Redford for his dedication to environmental causes. The Santa Monica native lobbied for numerous environmental causes onscreen and off, together with Native American rights, offshore oil drilling and international warming.
Since its founding within the ‘80s, Redford’s Sundance Institute and the Sundance Movie Pageant known as Utah’s Park Metropolis residence. Park Metropolis Mayor Nann Worel stated in an announcement on X (previously Twitter) that Redford “modified the trajectory” of the favored ski vacation spot.
“He introduced world-class artwork to our mountains and launched so many people to the facility of impartial movie. He was a maverick — unafraid to chart his personal path — displaying that concepts and creativity can flourish even amid our variations,” Worel stated. “His legacy is each lovely and profound, and one for which all of us needs to be deeply grateful.”
Starting in 2027, the Sundance Movie Pageant will transfer to Boulder, Colo., Sundance Institute board chair Ebs Burnough introduced earlier this 12 months. The Sundance Institute stated in an announcement its founder’s imaginative and prescient “has impressed generations of artists and redefined cinema within the U.S. and all over the world.”
“We are going to miss his generosity, readability of goal, curiosity, rebellious spirit and his love for the artistic course of,” the assertion stated. “We’re humbled to be among the many stewards of his exceptional legacy, which is able to proceed to information the Institute in perpetuity.”
Colman Domingo, Stephen King, SAG-AFTRA and Administrators Guild of America President Lesli Linka Glatter additionally paid tribute.
“He might be missed vastly,” publicist Berger stated in her assertion confirming Redford’s loss of life. “The household requests privateness.”
Former Occasions employees author Nardine Saad contributed to this report.
