Robert Redford, the Oscar-winning actor and Sundance founder who died Tuesday at 89, won’t soon be forgotten — Bob Woodward will make sure of it.
In a deeply felt statement posted to social media, the legendary investigative reporter paid tribute to his friend of five decades, who portrayed him in the acclaimed film All the President’s Men.
“Robert Redford was genuine, a noble and principled force for good who fought successfully to find and communicate the truth,” Woodward wrote. “Over 50 years of friendship, he always said what he was going to do and then did it.”
Woodward noted that it was Redford who urged him and his reporting partner, Carl Bernstein, to turn their landmark work breaking open the Watergate scandal into the best-selling 1974 book All the President’s Men, which ultimately served as the basis for the film. “His impact and influence on my life cannot be overstated,” Woodward said. “I loved him, and admired him — for his friendship, his fiery independence, and the way he used any platform he had to help make the world better, fairer, brighter for others.”
Woodward, 82, predicted that Redford — who earned the rare distinction of being nominated for both acting and directing Oscars, and won in 1980 for directing Ordinary People — “will be remembered as one of the great storytellers in our country’s history. He elevated stories beyond the mainstream.”
Directed by Alan J. Pakula and released in 1976, All the President’s Men took aim at the very heart of political corruption in America, chronicling in searing detail President Richard Nixon’s plot to spy on his political adversaries, Woodward and Bernstein’s reporting that exposed the plot in the Washington Post, and the impeachment process that led to Nixon’s resignation.
Redford was a driving force behind the project, buying the rights to Woodward and Bernstein’s book shortly after its release and tapping William Goldman to write the screen adaptation. Woodward further noted that their friendship didn’t stop there.
The veteran reporter included in his tribute a series of quotes from interviews spanning the past 50 years, with Redford weighing in on everything from the state of democracy in America to current President Donald Trump to his own legacy.
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“Time moves on and you have to move on with it or get lost behind,” Woodward quoted from one of his recent interviews with Redford. “At one time there was a long road ahead of me and now that road is a lot shorter and I don’t have a lot of time to mess around. So you do the best you can with what you’ve got left… We have to do something that changes the scenario, changes the dialogue. Just like we did many years ago with Watergate.”
In closing, Woodward signed off, “Godspeed, Robert Redford.”
Warner Bros./Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty
Woodward is one of many icons of the 20th century paying their respects to one of its most revered stars.
Jane Fonda, who starred opposite Redford in several films, including Barefoot in the Park and Our Souls at Night, said she “can’t stop crying” in a statement shared with Entertainment Weekly, adding that Redford “stood for an America we have to keep fighting for.”
