Jane Fonda names the sexiest star in cinema history: “She was a mensch”
It might sound unusual for a staunch feminist and activist like Jane Fonda to rank her colleagues and contemporaries based entirely on their looks, but if she wants to name the single sexiest star to have ever appeared on the silver screen, then who’s going to deny her that opportunity?
Fonda broke through at a time when studios, producers, and deal-makers were often more preoccupied with the aesthetics of female actors than their actual talent or ability to give jaw-dropping performances, and she’s been open in admitting just how deeply she was affected by the objectification and sexism she had to deal with during those early years.
Talent always speaks the loudest in the end, though, and few of her generation existed in the same stratosphere as Fonda. To put that into perspective, in the period between 1962 and 1982, she won two Academy Awards from six nominations, scooped a Primetime Emmy at the first attempt, took home a pair of Baftas from six nods, and claimed seven Golden Globes from 13 nominations.
That’s a remarkable trophy haul in a two-decade span, reinforcing Fonda’s position as one of the greats. Despite having a legend for a father, it was almost inevitable that she’d be placed under the same misogynistic microscope as her peers until she became such a massive star that she was able to pretty much write her own ticket, even if there were some headline-grabbing incidents along the way.
Of course, Fonda would never pit women against women or place one on a higher pedestal than another, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t have a definitive answer when she named the sexiest star of all time to The New York Times: “Ava Gardner was the sexiest woman I ever met without question. She was a mensch, a true mensch, and she was a babe.”
Calling Gardner a “babe” may not come across as very Fonda-esque, but she was every bit as enamoured with her persona as she was with her onscreen efforts. Much like herself, Gardner was a staunch supporter of the Civil Rights movement and a savvy business operator who wouldn’t think twice about putting men in their place regardless of what positions of power they held in either Hollywood or other industries.
Fonda and Gardner only worked together once on 1976’s drama The Blue Bird, which boasted a stacked roster that included director George Cukor and co-star Elizabeth Taylor. Unfortunately, it was panned by critics and died a painful death at the box office amid the political accusations that were destined to follow a cavalcade of American stars popping up in a film co-financed by a production company from the Soviet Union. Still, at least she got the chance to get first-hand exposure to the ‘Golden Age’ mensch.
