Jodie Foster kept Hollywood career secret from kids: 'I didn't want them to know me that way'
(L-R) Charlie Foster, actress Jodie Foster and Kit Foster at the 70th Annual Golden Globe Awards held at the Beverly Hilton Hotel on January 13, 2013. (Photo by: Paul Drinkwater/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images)
Jodie Foster has played dozens of diverse characters over her decades-long career in Hollywood, but for her two sons, she's just "mom."
During a recent appearance on "The View," Foster admitted to concealing her acting career from her children when they were young. "I guess I didn’t want them to know me that way," Foster shared. "I wanted them to know me as their mom and the person that went away to work and stuff. But I just didn’t want them to be confused about what I did for a living."
Foster and her former partner Cydney Bernard share two sons together, Charles "Charlie," 25, and Christopher "Kit," 22.
Acting was such a foreign concept that when Foster was pregnant with Kit, she says she took a then 3-year-old Charlie to work with her. "I brought him to set one day and I bought him a little plastic tool belt and stuff. And I was like, ‘Yeah, and this is this set and this set and this set.’ And for a really long time, he thought I was a construction worker."
Foster, now 61, didn't specify when she finally shared the truth, but both Charlie and Kit have accompanied her to several Hollywood events. Even with their support, Foster says they aren't watching her projects together.
Jodie Foster with sons Kit and Charles (Photo by Michael Buckner/Variety/Penske Media via Getty Images)
"They have no interest in watching my movies with me. I think they're going to catch ‘True Detective’ ‘cause they’re really into that," she said of her current television series.
"There’s a few films that I would never show them because I would be worried about being teased. ‘Nell’ for example, they've never seen, because they do tease me often about that, even though they've never seen the movie."
Foster starred alongside Liam Neeson in the 1994 flick as a recluse woman living in a cabin with limited communication.
The famed actress recently made headlines for her commentary on Gen Z, joking that they are difficult to work with, despite having two sons from that generation.
"They’re really annoying, especially in the workplace," she told The Guardian. "They’re like: ‘Nah, I’m not feeling it today, I’m gonna come in at 10:30 a.m.’ Or in emails, I’ll tell them: this is all grammatically incorrect, did you not check your spelling? And they’re like: ‘Why would I do that, isn’t that kind of limiting?’"