Jane Fonda claims 'this is the last article of clothing that I will ever buy'
Jane Fonda has been arrested four times in as many weeks over her now-famous climate change protests, and now she's taking her activism one step further.
The two-time Academy Award winner told a crowd of reporters in Washington D.C. last Friday that she plans to stop purchasing new clothes in order to help the environment. Fonda, who wore a long red coat while surrounded by fellow protestors on Capitol Hill, said the piece would be the final addition to her wardrobe.
"So, you see this coat?" Fonda said Friday, grabbing her jacket by its lapels. "I needed something red and I went out and found this coat on sale. This is the last article of clothing that I will ever buy."
Fonda, a longtime environmental activist, has recently made headlines for her "Fire Drill Fridays," a weekly protest in which she and many others surround Capitol Hill to draw attention to how climate change intersects with other global interests. The 81-year-old has said she plans to get arrested each time she protests.
"There is a collective crisis, requires collective action," Fonda told CNN. "And so I decided to use my celebrity to try to raise the sense of urgency, and I moved to Washington, and I'm going to get arrested every Friday."
As for her wardrobe, Fonda said she was inspired by 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg. The "Grace and Frankie" star told Glamour that although the two have yet to meet, Thunberg has changed her life.
"I grew up when consumerism didn’t have such a stranglehold over us," Fonda said of her decision. "So when I talk to people about how we don’t really need to keep shopping — we shouldn’t look to shopping for our identity; we just don’t need more stuff, then I have to walk the talk so I’m not buying any more clothes."
Fonda joked afterward that giving up shopping means she'll now have "a lot of free time." However, it seems as though she'll spend a lot of that time protesting: When the actress appeared on "The View" last week, she told viewers she plans to continue "Fire Drill Fridays" until January when production for "Grace and Frankie" will resume.
The show's hosts gave her a "care package" for the next time she's locked up, which will seemingly be every Friday through the end of the year. Fonda even told the New York Times that she plans to spend the morning of her 82nd birthday, which falls on Saturday, Dec. 21, in prison.
"Why be a celebrity if you can’t leverage it for something that is this important?" Fonda told the New York Times.