“I was so bad”: The performance Jodie Foster thought would kill her career
Even the biggest stars in the business doubt their own abilities, and Jodie Foster is no exception, who has appeared in everything from Disney movies to Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (playing a child prostitute), and yet has her moments when she’s convinced that her career is going to crumble.
This was the case when she starred in a movie during the 1980s that left her feeling deflated, a role she had pined for, and it almost slipped out of her grasp, but she knew she had to give it her all. However, once she saw a rough cut of the movie, she was convinced she’d absolutely fucked it, and there was no chance she could come back from it.
Well, this is a lesson not to ever doubt yourself too much, because Foster not only wound up nominated for an Oscar for the movie, but she won it, too, beating the likes of Meryl Streep and Glenn Close to won her first with The Accused, and she really couldn’t quite believe it.
“Paramount didn’t want me for that role, and I had to fight to get it. I wanted it so badly! The first time I saw the whole film, I thought I was so bad that my career was over,” the actor told Le Monde. The film was directed by Jonathan Kaplan and explores pretty hefty themes with Foster’s character seeking justice when she is gang-raped.
The incident takes place in a bar, where many drinkers encourage the heinous act, but when she is assigned an attorney, played by Kelly McGillis, it becomes clear that the men probably aren’t going to be prosecuted as severely as they should be.
The film becomes a fight for Sarah’s voice to be heard, as she does all she can to fight for everyone involved in the attack to be sent down for their actions. Naturally, it was a tough role to master, emotionally-charged and delicate, but Foster gave an incredible performance.
Still, she wasn’t convinced by her own turn in the film, and even though she was young, she was ready to pack her bags and leave Hollywood. “And then I won the Oscar, which changed everything,” she admitted, “Still, I always kept in mind that it could all end at any moment. My mother always said turning 40 was fatal for actresses. I’d almost resigned myself to that. But it kept going, at 40, 50, 60…”
The Accused was a turning point, then, for her, who would win another ‘Best Actress’ Oscar just a few years later for her role as Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs. It was one of the few horror movies that the Academy has ever championed, and alongside Anthony Hopkins, the pair walked home with golden statuettes.
Not many actors win Oscars in such close succession, but Foster evidently had the chops to become one of Hollywood’s greatest stars, a post she has continued to occupy decades later.
