Jane Fonda Honors Robert Redford at TCM Festival Opening

Jane Fonda opened the TCM Classic Film Festival with memory, humor, and heartbreak, turning a gala launch into a public farewell to Robert Redford.

Fonda took the stage Thursday night at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood to launch the festival’s 17th annual edition, but the event carried a deeper charge. Reports indicate she used the moment to honor her late co-star, recalling both their screen connection and the personal feeling that came with it. The festival underscored that bond by opening its four-day celebration of classic movies with their 1967 Neil Simon comedy.

“I had such a crush on him it was painful.”

That line gave the evening its spark, but the tribute reached beyond nostalgia. Fonda’s appearance linked the festival’s mission — preserving and revisiting beloved films — with the lived history behind them. In a setting built for reverence, her memories appeared to remind the audience that classic Hollywood still feels immediate when the people who made it speak plainly about love, admiration, and loss.

The choice of opening film mattered. TCM did more than schedule a recognizable title; it framed the festival around a relationship that helped define an era of American movie stardom. Sources suggest the programming aimed to blend celebration with remembrance, giving the audience a way to see the work again while hearing one of its stars place it in personal terms.

Now the festival moves into the rest of its four-day run, but Fonda’s tribute will likely linger as its defining image. That matters because classic-film culture depends on more than restoration and repertory screens — it depends on living witnesses who can connect old movies to real emotion. When figures like Fonda step forward, they don’t just preserve history; they make it feel urgent again.