Entertainment

Jodie Foster: We need to love our brothers and fathers in wake of Me Too

The actress said she thinks her child star status protected her from Hollywood’s abusers.
The actress said she thinks her child star status protected her from Hollywood’s abusers. The actress said she thinks her child star status protected her from Hollywood’s abusers.

Oscar-winner Jodie Foster has said being a child star helped her avoid being the victim of abuse and said we have to “love our brothers and fathers” in the wake of the Me Too movement.

The 55-year-old actress and director, who had her big break when she was just 12 and starred in Martin Scorsese’s film Taxi Driver, said people must find a way to move forward.

She told Porter Edit: “This is a transitional period, and it’s just so painful. You really have to have a plan for truth and reconciliation.

“We can’t put every man over 30 in jail. We have to love our brothers and fathers and come to an understanding about how we got here and who wer are going to be together.”

Ms Foster added that she believes her mother and her own child-star status insulated her from the perils of Hollywood.

She said: “Working from the time I was three, supporting my family by the time that I was seven, super-strong mom, over-confident personality, celebrity young enough that I learned to be stand-offish.

“There’s a whole bunch of reasons why I didn’t have the same path as someone who came to Hollywood at 22 with two cents in her pocket.

Her “super strong mom”, Evelyn Ella Almond, also spurred Foster to achieve out of a fear of abandonment.

“You operate on this primordial thing: If Mom goes crazy or is in a heap on the floor, or if she doesn’t have any money, she is going to leave me,” explained the actress, who won Oscars for her lead roles in Silence Of The Lambs and The Accused.

“That’s always having to get straight A’s, to be the best at everything, checking every single box, so my mom won’t leave me.

“I still feel that now, which is weird because my mom has dementia.”

Foster said she believes the film industry is now changing, but she still tries to help others share the benefit of her experience.

She said: “I do reach out sometimes to women in the industry. And men, too, who I can see would benefit from the experience I have had about surviving in tact.

“If there is anything that I have to be a role model about, it is prioritising my own self-worth and psychological health above all.”

She added: “Not only is our culture evolving, but we are, too.

“I don’t think there is a woman I know who doesn’t look back on when they were 15, 16, 17 or 18, who doesn’t put their hand on their head and say: ‘Why did I do that? Why was I like that?”

“At least my kids’ schools are supporting the right programs. These kids are really grilled about consent.”