bitchy | Jodie Foster on Gen Z: ‘They’re really annoying, especially in the workplace’

Jodie Foster is 61 years old and she’s spent more than fifty years in the industry. She’s won two Oscars and she’s raised two sons. She’s currently promoting True Detective: Night Country, where she plays an Alaska cop. People who have gotten early screeners of this True Detective season say that it’s brilliant and Jodie is great in it. She’s also promoting Nyad a little bit – that’s the Netflix movie where she plays the coach of Diana Nyad. I’ve always liked Jodie and it feels like she’s more relaxed these days, less guarded and chattier in general. She recently spoke to the Guardian about True Detective, motherhood, working with so many young artists and her informal mentorship of young actors. Some highlights:

What it was like to work with so many younger people on ‘True Detective’: “Well, I’m pretty fun. I mean – I don’t take anything seriously. I make jokes all the time. And, you know, I’m not an expert… I just know me, I don’t really know anybody else, and even as a director – I’m not really an actor’s director, interestingly.”

Working with ‘True Detective’ director Issa Lopez: “She has directed four movies, and I’ve been in so many films, and I think that part is sometimes daunting. But we bonded immediately and laughed through everything. I like it when directors tell me what they want and say things like faster, slower. I’m not interested in directors who are like” – she puts on a whispery, luvvie-ish voice – “‘Here, let me shake you!’ She might have to do that with other people, because they’re young or they’ve never acted before. And I would watch her do that with them and … You’d better not do that with me.”

Her advice to younger people in the industry: “They need to learn how to relax, how to not think about it so much, how to come up with something that’s theirs. I can help them find that, which is so much more fun than being, with all the pressure behind it, the protagonist of the story.”

She’s trying to mentor Bella Ramsey & other young actors: “I do a lot of reaching out to young actresses. I’m compelled. Because it was hard growing up.” When she looks at Ramsey, who told British Vogue earlier this year that “I’m not 100% straight”, does she feel a pang of sympathy for her younger self? “Yes.” It was so bleak. “But I had my mom, you know.”

She admires the way Bella Ramsey exists in the world: “We weren’t free. Because we didn’t have freedom. And hopefully that’s what the vector of authenticity that’s happening offers – the possibility of real freedom. We had other things that were good. And I would say: I did the best I could for my generation. I was very busy understanding where I fitted in and where I wanted to be in terms of feminism. But my lens wasn’t wide enough. I lived in an incredibly segregated world.”

For all her cheerleading of Gen Z, Foster isn’t above being irritated by them. “They’re really annoying, especially in the workplace. They’re like, ‘Nah, I’m not feeling it today, I’m gonna come in at 10.30am.’ Or, like, 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?’”

Her two sons, who were raised by three women: “My two don’t like sports. They like to watch movies and sit at home, and they’re really into their female friends. They’re super feminist. And there was a moment with my older one when he was in high school, when, because he was raised by two women – three women – it was like he was trying to figure out what it was to be a boy. And he watched television and came to the conclusion, oh, I just need to be an a–hole. I understand! I need to be sh-tty to women, and act like I’m a f–ker. And I was like, no! That’s not what it is to be a man! That’s what our culture has been selling you for all this time.” The phase went on for six months, she says. Did she let it play out? “Yes, and no. I was like, you won’t be talking to me like that.”

[From The Guardian]

I like this answer: “I did the best I could for my generation.” I think that’s very true – there was a time when the LGBTQ community wanted Jodie to be more public, more vocal about her sexuality and her life and she just refused. It was a generational thing but it was also just about Jodie needing to keep things a certain way to feel safe, which is partly generational and partly about her own experiences. As for what she says about Gen Z… lmao. That’s going to upset some people. She’s not wrong though, just my opinion!

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.