Jane Fonda didn’t enjoy paying tribute to Robert Redford at the Oscars ceremony.
The 88-year-old actress and activist revealed after the March 15 ceremony that she felt she should have been chosen instead of Barbra Streisand to honor the late director. Streisand, who co-starred with Redford in The Way We Were, gave a short speech at the Academy Awards praising their friendship and sang part of the film’s title song.
“I want to know why Streisand did that for Redford?” Fonda told Entertainment Tonight at the Vanity Fair afterparty.
Fonda playfully added that Streisand “only made one movie with him, but I made four! I have more to say.” He added that he “always loved” Redford, who died on September 16 at the age of 89, and said he was “the most gorgeous human being and a man with great values.” “And he did a lot for film, really changing film and elevating independent film.”
In her eulogy, Streisand, who played nervous, political flamethrower Katie Morosky opposite Redford’s Wasp Hubbell Gardiner in The Way We Were, called her former co-star “an intelligent cowboy who carved out his own path.”
“Bob had a real backbone on and off screen,” Streisand said, revealing that he couldn’t have imagined anyone else in the role. “I miss him now more than ever,” she added.
Fonda, who held up a pin that read “Stop the Merger,” was a clear nod to Paramount’s recent bid to buy Warner Bros. in the run-up to the Oscars, and often acted in opposition to Redford. The pair appeared in a series of films in the ’60s and ’70s, including The Chase, Barefoot in the Park and Electric Horseman, before reuniting decades later for 2017’s Our Souls at Night.
