Jane Fonda gives politically-charged speech at SAG Awards: ‘Woke just means you give a damn about other people’

Honoree Jane Fonda accepts the SAG Life Achievement Award onstage during the 31st Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards on February 23, 2025 in Los Angeles, California. (Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

Jane Fonda persevered over some audio issues Sunday night to encourage activism at the SAG Awards.

Fonda received the SAG lifetime achievement award at the event, and the 87-year-old actress reminded the room, “It’s okay 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,” she said, gesturing to her statuette. “Yeah. I love acting. We get to open people’s minds to new ideas, take them beyond what they understand of the world and help ‘em laugh when things are tough, like now.”

The woman who is as much an activist as a star then reminded the world of her political passions, including saying she is “a big believer in unions.”

“And this is really important right now when workers’ power is being attacked, and community is being weakened,” Fonda said.

Fonda then pointed out that SAG, which stands for Screen Actors Guild, is different from other unions since actors don’t create something tangible, but rather “create empathy.” She shared some of her views on acting, including “while you may hate the behavior of your character, you have to understand and empathize with the traumatized person you’re playing, right?” using the example, among others, of Oscar-nominee Sebastian Stan starring as Donald Trump in the film “The Apprentice.”

“Make no mistake, empathy is not weak or woke,” Fonda noted. “And, by the way, woke just means you give a damn about other people.”

Fonda, an outspoken critic of President Donald Trump, also made reference to current events.

“A whole lot of people are going to be really hurt by what is happening, what is coming our way,” she said. “And even if they’re of a different political persuasion, we need to call upon our empathy and not judge, but listen from our hearts and welcome them into our tent because we are going to need a big tent to resist successfully what’s coming at us.”

The two-time Oscar-winner made references to defining events in history, like the Civil Rights movement, and added, “we are in our documentary moment” right now.

She ended by offering words of encouragement, saying, “There will still be beauty, and there will be an ocean of truth for us to swim in” on the other side.