Jodie Foster regrets failing ‘a lot of people’ as a young star, warns new generation is ‘torturing’ themselves

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Jodie Foster has been in Hollywood since she was a young girl, and feels protective of the generations of actresses that have followed her.

In a new interview with Elle for their 2023 Women in Hollywood issue, Foster offered her advice to the up and comers, admitting she focuses on "almost entirely maternal advice."

"I find myself reaching out to girls who could be my daughters and saying, ‘Wait a minute, you keep doing dumb things on publicity tours. What’s going on with you? This is a little self-sabotage. You know better than that. Who’s letting you do that? And where’s your mom?’" the 61-year-old said. 

"I do have this really big soft spot for the young actresses who came up as young people, because I just don’t know how they survive without some mother around the way I had a mom around," she continued.

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Jodie Foster said in Elle's Women in Hollywood issue that she offers "maternal advice" to younger actresses. (Zoey Grossman/Elle)

"To be able to say, ‘You’re overexposed,’ or ‘You’re torturing yourself,’ or ‘You have to have faith in your talent. You can go away for two years and have a life and come back and there will be work for you. Yeah, maybe it won’t be in some franchise, but what do you care? This is your life.’"

Foster’s career began with TV roles like "The Courtship of Eddie’s Father" and Disney films like "Napoleon and Samantha," before she landed a major role in Martin Scorsese’s "Taxi Driver," earning Foster her first Oscar nomination, for best supporting actress.

Foster had a breakthrough role in "Taxi Driver" alongside Robert De Niro. (Columbia Pictures/Fotos International/Getty Images)

"That film completely changed my life," she told The New York Times in 1991. "It was the first time anyone asked me to create a character that wasn't myself. It was the first time I realized that acting wasn't this hobby you just sort of did, but that there was actually some craft."

After "Taxi Driver" she went on to become a mega star, with dozens of credits to her name, and two best actress Oscar wins, for "The Accused" and "Silence of the Lambs," and an additional nomination for "Nell."

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Jodie Foster won Oscars in 1989 and 1992 for "The Accused" and "Silence of the Lambs," respectively. (Getty Images)

As she continued acting, Foster also added director to her resume, with films like "Little Man Tate," "Home for the Holidays" and "The Beaver," as well as several producing credits.

Her career serves as an inspiration, but Foster notes that she came up in a world dominated by men.

"Forget women directors, I worked with no women on sets for the first 20 years of my career. Sometimes there was a script supervisor or makeup hair artist, but most of the time when I was young there wasn’t, it was just me and a whole bunch of guys," she said. 

The "Contact" star credits her experiences on set with her becoming a director, saying, "I benefited from those relationships, and I wouldn’t be a director today, certainly, if I didn’t have those old men who believed in me."

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Foster told Elle she hopes she's been "able to bring other women up" with her work as a director and actress. (Zoey Grossman/Elle)

She added, "So I don’t have the same story as a lot of people have. I got first dibs and hopefully I’ve been able to bring other women up."

A lifetime in Hollywood has left Foster with some regrets, particularly when it comes to being famous at a young age. 

"I find myself tapping people on the shoulder and apologizing about who I was when I was in my 20s, saying ‘I can’t believe I was so self-involved and so unaware of my own privileges,'" she told Elle. 

"I was a terrible friend because I was busy shooting. Unless you have that time as a regular person, you become stunted in so many ways. I accomplished a lot, but as a person, I was really behind. It’s a hard lesson to learn, because you have to look in the mirror and say, ‘I failed a lot of people, and I wasn’t the person I could have been.’"

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Foster said being famous at a young age made her "a terrible friend" due to her busy schedule.  (Zoey Grossman/Elle)

Hollywood and too much attention are also why Foster shuns social media, even if it would appear to be beneficial to her career.

"I’m okay with sacrificing a certain amount of success or access in order for me to have the life that I want," she said. "So yeah, my friends have it, and I look over their shoulders, and if it was just the babies and dogs and dancing, it would be amazing. But I know how to take care of myself. And maybe that’s a product of my baggage in the terrible world that I came out of, like my own survival mechanism. But I know what it takes to survive, and I really feel bad for young people."

Foster explained she thinks younger people are "building muscles about criticism and they’re becoming inured to it, and somehow surviving a different way" but feels "celebrity culture is already toxic."

"To try to have celebrity culture be a part of the fabric of who we are as people in the world, it’s just really like... why would you do that to yourself?"

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The 61-year-old told Elle she's not interested in social media, partially because "celebrity culture is already toxic." (Zoey Grossman/Elle)

The "Nyad" star is generally over criticisms directed at her.

"I don’t really care about other people’s opinions," she told Elle.

She continued, saying that at a certain age, "You might as well do more of the things you love, less of the things you hate, and stop beating yourself up for something you can’t control – that you’ve gotten older and there is a relevance change. And there’s something amazing about acting in my 60s and supporting other people. I think I enjoy it more than anything I’ve ever done."