Hayden Panettiere reveals comical reason she was axed from playing Jodie Foster’s daughter in ‘Panic Room’
Hayden Panettiere has revealed the comical but true reason she was axed from playing Jodie Foster’s daughter in the film Panic Room, saying, “it was a deal-breaker”.
The actor had been cast in the 2002 thriller movie, directed by David Fincher, when she was only 12 years old. However, a series of issues blighted the movie, including Nicole Kidman withdrawing due to an injury, which subsequently led Jodie Foster to replace her.
Panettiere was revealing the details behind the film in her new memoir, This is Me: A Reckoning, released today (May 19th), adding that she was “speechless” to later learn that Kristen Stewart had taken over her role.
Per The Independent, she began by saying she had been “overjoyed” to learn of Foster’s casting as she “was one of my favorite actors, and I could relate to her because she’d been working since she was a kid, just like me. People had said we looked like each other because both of us were small and strong.”
However, she noted that the producers of Panic Room had decided to change their plans, allegedly because she did not look enough like Foster.
“I was speechless,” Panettiere said. “I did look like Jodie Foster. Not just that, but I’d earned this part. How could anyone take that away from me?”
The Scream star said she initially “never got an explanation,” but, “I accepted it, even though I was incredibly sad.”
The biggest revelation came years later down the line, as Panettiere revealed in the book that she only found out the real reason as an adult, when her former manager confessed. She said: “The director spoke to Mom about cutting my hair so I would look more like Jodie Foster, who’s always rocked a great bob. Mom said no. It was a deal-breaker.”
Elsewhere in the memoir, Panettiere alleged that an unnamed Oscar-winning male actor exposed himself to her while she was attending a Hollywood party at only 19 years old.
During an interview with Far Out last year, the former child star said she was keen to change the landscape for other young people now working in the movie industry, due to her own experiences of directors and actors “who had zero patience for children and zero respect.”
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