Trivia

As a child, she was attacked by a lion and carried briefly in its mouth while filming Disney's Napoleon and Samantha (1972).

Fluent in French by age 14, she spoke her own lines in the film Moi, Fleur bleue (1977), the film A Very Long Engagement (2004) and the film The Brave One (2007). She learned spanish at a young age. She was also fluent in Italian by age 18.

Got the role of Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs (1991) after Michelle Pfeiffer turned the role down.

Because she speaks perfect French, she makes the dubbing over her character's voice for most of her films released in France.

Her sister, Connie Foster, was her stand-in during Taxi Driver (1976).

Replaced Nicole Kidman in the role of Meg Altman in Panic Room (2002) at the last minute when Kidman injured herself.

Considers her performance in Nell (1994) as her best one.

Avoids social media such as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

Foster was pursued by an obsessed fan named John Hinckley Jr.. Hinckley came up with a plan to impress her by assassinating President Ronald Reagan. Shortly before 2:30 PM EST, as Reagan walked out of the hotel's T Street NW exit toward his waiting car, Hinckley emerged from the crowd of admirers and fired a .22-cal. blue steel revolver six times in three seconds, missing the President with all six shots. The first bullet hit White House Press Secretary James Brady in the head. The second hit District of Columbia police officer Thomas K. Delahanty in the back. The third overshot Reagan and hit the window of a building across the street. The fourth hit Secret Service agent Timothy J. McCarthy in the abdomen. The fifth hit the bullet-resistant glass of the window on the open side door of the president's limousine. The sixth and final bullet ricocheted off the side of the limousine and hit the president in his left underarm, grazing a rib and lodging in his lung, stopping nearly an inch from his heart. In 2016, Hinckley was released (under a number of conditions) from the psychiatric hospital in which he had been institutionalized.

Was chosen from among 18,000 applicants, of whom 200 were auditioned, for the role of Iris Steensma in Taxi Driver (1976), as screenwriter Paul Schrader wanted an unknown actress for the role.

Made her acting debut in a Coppertone Suntan Lotion commercial when she was 3 years old.

Received her Bachelor's degree in literature, magna cum laude from Yale University in New Haven, CT. (1985)

Was reading by the time she was three years old.

Her favorite actors are Robert De Niro, Paul Newman, Marlon Brando and Humphrey Bogart and her favorite actresses are Meryl Streep, Jane Fonda, Diane Keaton and Katharine Hepburn.

Has said that her only regret is that she would love to live life without knowing what it's like to be famous.

Producer of Freaky Friday (2003) Andrew Gunn had initially hoped she would be game to play the mother, as Foster had played the daughter in the original film Freaky Friday (1976). Foster declined, in part because of concerns that the casting stunt would overshadow the movie's overall merit.

At age 29, she became the second youngest person to win two Academy Awards, behind Luise Rainer (28). She won twice for Best Actress in a Leading Role for performances she gave at age 24 during filming of The Accused (1988) in the spring of 1987 and at age 26-turning-27 during filming of The Silence of the Lambs (1991) in the winter of 1989-90.

In an article published on September 5, 2006, Foster told the New York Times that she is such a "'serious N.P.R. [National Public Radio]-head', the sort of person who will sit in her garage listening to the car radio until a show is over" that she changed her character in The Brave One (2007) from a newspaper reporter to the host of a public radio show.

During her college years, was stalked by John Hinckley Jr. who attempted to assassinate US President Ronald Reagan to impress her. (March 30, 1981)

Has a reported IQ of 132.

Enjoys kickboxing, yoga, karate, aerobics, and weightlifting and collects fancy kitchenware and B&W photos.

An asteroid, 17744 Jodiefoster, was named after her (1998).

The two people with whom she has been in her longest-term relationships both worked on The L Word (2004). Cydney Bernard, with whom Foster had her two children (they were together from 1993 to 2008) was a unit production manager on the show, and Alexandra Hedison, whom Foster married in April 2014, played the character Dylan Moreland.

Was considered for the role of Alma Coin in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014), but was busy filming Elysium (2013). The role ultimately went to Julianne Moore. Coincidentally, Moore replaced Foster as Clarice Starling in the sequel to The Silence of the Lambs (1991), Hannibal (2001).

Born Alicia Christian Foster, her three siblings insisted on calling her "Jodie" after their mother's live-in girlfriend, Josephine Dominguez Hill, who was known as "Jo D".

Sean Penn's role in The Game (1997) was originally written as a female character with Foster in mind to portray. In the original script, Foster would play the daughter of Michael Douglas's character. However, Douglas insisted that the female character be changed to his sister; Foster did not like the idea as she was far too young to play his sister, and she withdrew from the project.

Youngest host of Saturday Night Live (1975) until Drew Barrymore hosted in 1982.

Made an acceptance speech at a breakfast for Hollywood Reporter's Women in Entertainment, where she paid tribute to her longtime companion Cydney Bernard, ending all speculations about her sexual orientation. (December 2007)

Decided not to reprise the role of Clarice Starling in Hannibal (2001), which eventually went to Julianne Moore.

Was considered for the role of Claire Standish in The Breakfast Club (1985), which went to Molly Ringwald.

Can play the guitar, composes songs and is fluent in French and Italian.

At the 31st AFI Life Achievement Awards, Jodie Foster credited Robert De Niro with introducing her to the true craft of acting. During production of Taxi Driver (1976), he would insist that they'd meet for coffee and rehearse their scenes from together at a local diner. After a while, Jodie became bored of the routine until De Niro began improvising lines during their rehearsals. Jodie soon learned to follow his improv as he weaved back and forth to the original script, in essence teaching her how to effectively build a character beyond the screenplay.

While filming Napoleon and Samantha (1972),Jodie Foster was attacked by one of the lions and carried briefly in its mouth. She still has the scars from the attack. When she appears naked in certain films, she is photographed from specific angles to conceal the scars.

Her Oscar-winning role as Clarice Starling from her film The Silence of the Lambs (1991) was ranked #6 in the American Film Institute's "Heroes" list in AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes & Villains (2003).

In July 2016, John Hinckley was released after almost 35 years of commission to St. Elizabeth's Mental Institution. His release was contingent on dozens of conditions, including mandatory residence with his elderly mother in her home in a Williamsburg, Virginia, gated community and a ban on use of social media and/or the internet to read about his own crimes or other assassins. He is also forbidden from attempting or making any contact with an array of people connected to his crimes, including his victims, their relatives, or Jodie Foster.

Her performance as Sarah Tobias in The Accused (1988) is ranked #56 on Premiere magazine's 100 Greatest Performances of All Time (2006).

Like Kim Basinger, Foster was also offered the role of Annie Reed in Sleepless in Seattle (1993), but she declined it, because as in the case with Basinger she thought the premise of the movie was ridiculous. The role instead went to Meg Ryan and the film became a massive box office success.

Born to Lucius Fisher Foster (1922-2016), from Colorado, an Air Force colonel and real estate agent, who had three sons from a previous marriage and one daughter from a subsequent marriage; and Evelyn Della "Brandy" Almond (1928-2019), a film producer, from the Bronx, New York. On her father's side, she has deep Colonial American roots in Massachusetts and Connecticut.

Cited The Deer Hunter (1978) as her favorite film.

Gave birth to her first child at age 35, a son Charles Foster on July 20, 1998, with partner Cydney Bernard.

Turned down the role of Andie Walsh in Pretty in Pink (1986), which went to Molly Ringwald.

Considers her role in The Silence of the Lambs (1991) to be a counterpart to her role in Taxi Driver (1976). In Taxi Driver (1976), she is a young girl in bondage who has to be rescued. In The Silence of the Lambs (1991), she rescues the captive woman. In an interesting twist, her pimp in Taxi Driver (1976) was played by Harvey Keitel, who went on to play Clarice Starling's (her character in Silence of the Lambs") mentor, Jack Crawford, in Red Dragon (2002).

Graduated as the class valedictorian from the private academy Le Lycée Français in Los Angeles, California. (June 1980)

Is one of 12 actresses who won the Best Actress Oscar for a movie that also won the Best Picture Oscar (she won for The Silence of the Lambs (1991)). The others are Claudette Colbert for It Happened One Night (1934), Luise Rainer for The Great Ziegfeld (1936), Vivien Leigh for Gone with the Wind (1939), Greer Garson for Mrs. Miniver (1942), Louise Fletcher for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), Diane Keaton for Annie Hall (1977), Shirley MacLaine for Terms of Endearment (1983), Jessica Tandy for Driving Miss Daisy (1989), Gwyneth Paltrow for Shakespeare in Love (1998), Hilary Swank for Million Dollar Baby (2004) and Frances McDormand for Nomadland (2020).

Her family celebrates both Christmas and Hanukkah.

Ranked #30 on Entertainment Weekly's 50 Smartest People in Hollywood (2007).

She has appeared in two films that have been selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant: Taxi Driver (1976) and The Silence of the Lambs (1991).

Parents divorced three years before she was born. She was raised by her mother Brandy and Josephine Dominguez Hill (1930-1984), Brandy's lesbian lover.

As of 2012, she is the 10th youngest person to receive an Academy Award for Best Actress.

Shut down production company Egg Pictures in late 2001 to spend more time with her children.