Metal bunks, bologna and J-Lo: Jane Fonda details her night in DC jail over climate protests, in book excerpt exclusive to The Independent

The Oscar winner recalls what it was like to go to prison in her eighties - almost half a century after her first stay behind bars

Jane Fonda’s overnight stay in a prison cell a smattering of blocks from the White House, she acknowledges, was better than for most.

“I was photographed for my mug shot, offered a bologna and cheese sandwich on white bread wrapped in cellophane and a plastic cup of purple juice of some kind, and locked into a cell by myself with a female guard stationed outside all night to protect me,” she writes in her new book, What Can I Do?, a call-to-action and memoir of her climate protests in DC, published on Tuesday.

“I was more than aware that I was being treated differently because I was white and famous. A cell to myself, juice when I wanted it, a guard.”


In late 2019, Fonda moved from California to DC and joined forces with fellow activists to lead weekly climate change demonstrations on Capitol Hill in what became known as “Fire Drill Fridays”.

The plan of nonviolent civil disobedience led to the two-time Oscar winner being arrested five times.


While the gatherings were small to begin with by November 2019, the number of people demonstrating and risking arrest had grown, as had the media coverage and number of celebrity friends that Fonda rallied to join the protest line.

Ahead of the protest on 1 November, Fonda, now 82, writes that she was advised by her lawyer she would likely spend a night in she had a pending court date due to three priors, her arrest would likely result in a night in jail.

“I was okay with that. I’d been in jail before . . . but never for civil disobedience.”

At the height of her anti-Vietnam War campaigning in the Seventies, Fonda was arrested on suspicion on drug trafficking (it was actually vitamins she was carrying), reportedly at the direction of then President Nixon.

As expected, after being rounded up with other protesters in group detention, Fonda’s plastic zip-tie cuffs were upgraded to a metal pair.  She was shackled to the floor of a police van for transport and held overnight until arraignment the following day.

Despite having experience behind bars, the experience had a chilling effect on her, she wrote.

“My feet were again shackled, and I was questioned about whether I had ever been sexually abused. I told them I had. “Were you ever abused while incarcerated?” the officer asked, to which I answered in the negative. There were posters everywhere, it seemed, asking if you had ever been sexually abused while incarcerated and, if so, to call a hotline. I didn’t remember seeing such things the last time I was inside a jail in the 1970s, and I found it spooky.”

The seasoned activist spent the night like any other inmate, in a no-frills cell, “two metal-slab ‘bunk beds’ and a metal toilet. No sharp edges, nothing that could be broken off and used as a weapon or for self-harm".

She passed the time by doing wall squats and meditating, eventually being able to get some sleep by using her red coat, which has become a symbol of the protest movement, as a cover.

Fonda describes hearing, but not seeing, another inmate howling in despair all night long, and the clanging of the guards making their rounds.

“I was about to ask them to please keep the noise down because I wanted to sleep but then realized what a sign of white privilege that would have been and I shut up, chuckling to myself as I imagined that was something Grace might do if this were a scene from Grace and Frankie," she quipped about her Netflix series. 

The following day, she was transferred to a holding pen with other prisoners, all African-American women, Fonda writes, with one suffering badly from burns on her feet. She describes chatting with the women and the rising level of incredulity that she chosen to be in jail. One woman asked about the climate protests.

“I did my best to explain what was happening to the planet, but it was clearly not of interest. I told them I was a film and TV actor and that helped me get the word out through the press," she writes.

"They sat up and took a little more notice . . . but not all that much. Clearly all of them had more pressing things weighing them down. “What movies have you made?” one asked. I knew it was likely that they had seen one in particular. “I was in Monster-in-Law with Jennifer Lopez.” Yep, that one all four of them had seen.”

Moved to second larger holding pen with other women, Fonda notes that "it became clear that none of them belonged in jail”.

“They needed mental health care, decent jobs, freedom from abuse, a supportive community, and basic respect and fairness.”

Apparently concerned by how much she was talking, the guards moved her to another cell to wait alone.

By 1pm, it was over. As with all the protesters who are arrested as part of the Fire Drill Fridays movement, jail support was waiting to greet her.

“As I hugged them and scanned the faces, I caught sight of my daughter, Vanessa, and burst into tears, so moved that she had stayed over to welcome me out. She was crying, too. It was an important moment for us,” she wrote.

What Can I Do? My Path from Climate Despair to Action by Jane Fonda is published on Tuesday