Alicia Christian" Jodie "Foster(born
November 19, 1962) is an
American actress, director and producer who has worked in films and on television. She has often been cited as one of the best actresses of her generation.
Foster began her career at the age of three as a child model in
1965, and two years later moved to acting in television series, with the sitcomMayberry
R.F.D.being her debut
. In the late
1960s and early
1970s, she worked in several primetime television series and starred in children's films. Foster's breakthrough came inMartin
Scorsese 'sTaxi
Driver(
1976), in which she played a teenage prostitute; the role garnered her a nomination for anAcademy
Award . Her other critically acclaimed roles as a teenager were in the musicalBugsy
Malone(1976) and the thrillerThe
Little Girl Who Lives
Down the
Lane(1976), and she became a popular teen idol by starring inDisney 'sFreaky Friday(1976),
Candleshoe(
1977) andFoxes(
1980).After attending college at
Yale, Foster struggled to transition to adult roles until winning widespread critical acclaim for her portrayal of a rape survivor inThe
Accused(
1988), for which she won several awards, including an
Academy Award and aGolden
Globe . She won her second Academy Award three years later for her role in thesleeper hit
The Silence of the Lambs , where she playedClarice
Starling , anFBItrainee investigating aserial murdercase. Foster made her debut as a film director the same year with the moderately successfulLittle Man
Tate(
1991), and founded her own production company, Egg
Pictures, in
1992.
The company's first production wasNell(
1994), in which she also played the title role, gaining another nomination for an Academy Award. Her other films in the
1990s included period dramaSommersby ,WesterncomedyMaverick(1994),science fiction film
Contact(
1997), and period dramaAnna and the
King(
1999). Her second film direction,
Home for the Holidays(
1995), was not well-received commercially, while critical reviews were mixed.After career setbacks in the early
2000s, which included the cancellation of a film project and the closing down of her production company, Foster starred in four thrillers,
Panic Room(
2002),
Flightplan(
2005),
Inside Man(
2006) andThe
Brave One(
2007). She has focused on directing in the 2010s, directing the filmsThe
Beaver(
2011) andMoney
Monster(2016), as well as episodes forNetflixtelevision seriesOrange is the New BlackandHouse of Cards . She also starred in the filmElysium(
2013). In addition to her two
Academy Awards, Foster has won threeBAFTA
Awards , threeGolden Globe Awards , aScreen
Actors Guild Awardand theCecil B DeMille Award .Foster was born on November 19, 1962 in
Los Angeles, as the youngest child of
Evelyn Ella "
Brandy" (née Almond) and
Lucius Fisher Foster
III. Her father came from a wealthyChicagofamily, whose forebears includedJohn Alden , who had arrived in
North America on theMayflowerin 1620.He was aYalegraduate and a decoratedU.S.
Air Force lieutenant colonel , and made his career as a real estate broker. He had already been married once and had three sons from the union before marrying
Brandy inLas Vegasin
1953. Brandy Foster was of
German heritage and grew up inRockford,
Illinois . Foster also has
Irish roots, with ancestry that can be traced back toCounty
Cork . Before Foster's birth, she and Lucius had three other children: daughters
Lucinda "
Cindy" Foster (b. 1954) and
Constance "
Connie" Foster (b.
1955), and sonLucius Fisher "
Buddy" Foster(b.
1957). Their marriage ended before Foster was born, and she never established a relationship with her father.
Following the divorce, Brandy raised the children with her partner in
Los Angeles. She worked as apublicistfor film producerArthur P. Jacobs , until focusing on managing the acting careers of
Buddy and
Jodie. Although Foster was officially named
Alicia, her siblings began calling her "Jodie", and the name stuck.Foster was a gifted child, and learned to read at the age of three.She attended a French-languageprep school , theLycée
Français de
Los Angeles . Her fluency in
French has enabled her to act in
French films, and she alsodubsherself in
French-language versions of most of her
English-language films. She also understands
Italian although does not speak it, as well as a little
Spanish and German. At her graduation in 1980, she delivered thevaledictorianaddress for the school's French division. Although already a successful actor by this time, Foster then attended
Yale University inNew
Haven,
Connect
- published: 22 Jul 2016
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