Jane Fonda, sister of Peter Fonda, has released a statement following his death today at the age of 79.
“I am very sad. He was my sweet-hearted baby brother,” Fonda said in the statement provided to Deadline. “The talker of the family. I have had beautiful alone time with him these last days. He went out laughing.”
The two-time Oscar nominee for Easy Rider, which he also produced and co-wrote, and Ulee’s Gold, died Friday morning of respiratory failure due to lung cancer. The son of legendary actor Henry Fonda and father of Bridget and Justin Fonda, was a part of the counterculture of the 1960s.
Following Easy Rider, Fonda starred in and directed The Hired Hand (1971), a feminist Western that his Pando Company made for Universal. Roger Ebert described it as “a languorously spiritual Western about a young man who grows up into responsibility.” He went on to direct Idaho Transfer (1973), a message film about the environment. He also directed and starred opposite Brooke Shields in Wanda Nevada (1979), which featured a cameo by his father.
His recent work included the role of Mephistopheles in the Nicolas Cage pic Ghost Rider and played, yet again, a biker in the John Travolta-Tim Allen comedy Wild Hogs. Those were followed the 2007 remake 3:10 to Yuma and he reunited with Cage in the 2015 Louisiana political drama The Runner.
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