Best Of: Jodie Foster / Tessa Thompson
Fresh Air
NPR
4.3 • 36.1K Ratings
🗓️ 17 January 2026
⏱️ 51 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Jodie Foster has been acting since she was 3. At 12 she was nominated for an Oscar for her role in Scorsese’s ‘Taxi Driver.’ This year marks the 50th anniversary of that film. Foster spoke with Terry Gross about her early acting career, including getting mauled by a lion on set. Her new film is ‘A Private Life.’
Tessa Thompson stars in the new Netflix murder mystery limited series ‘His & Hers’ and in Nia DaCosta’s adaptation of Ibsen’s ‘Hedda.’ She spoke with Tonya Mosley about navigating her biracial identity and why she has both “yes” and “no” tattooed.
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| 0:00.0 | Support for NPR comes from NPR member stations and Eric and Wendy Schmidt through the Schmidt Family Foundation, working toward a healthy, resilient, secure world for all. On the web at theshmit.org. |
| 0:15.2 | From W. H.Y.Y. In Philadelphia, this is Fresh Air Weekend, I'm Tanya Mosley. Today, Jody Foster. She's been acting |
| 0:23.1 | since she was three. And when she was nine, she was working on a Disney film with a trained |
| 0:28.2 | lion who went off script and picked her up in his mouth. He held me horizontally and then |
| 0:35.1 | flipped me around and shook me. So I watched the entire film crew run in |
| 0:40.8 | the opposite direction, sideways. Foster was 12 when she played a child prostitute in taxi driver, |
| 0:47.2 | a role that would define her early career and make her one of the most celebrated actors of |
| 0:51.8 | her generation. Also, we hear from Tessa Thompson. |
| 0:56.1 | She stars in the new Netflix Murder Mystery Limited series, His and Hers. She's built a career |
| 1:01.7 | on characters in independent films and blockbusters, from Valkyrie in the Marvel Universe, to |
| 1:07.6 | Bianca and the Creed films to the calculating Charlotte and Westworld. |
| 1:12.4 | That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend. |
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