While taking a stroll down memory lane, Jodie Foster revealed how a lion picked her up with its mouth while on the set of the 1972 film Napoleon and Samantha.
During her recent appearance on The Graham Norton Show, Foster recalled her terrifying experience with the lion. She was 9 years old while Napoleon and Samantha was in production.
“We finished a take and I was going up the hill,” Jodie Foster said. “And all I remember is I remember seeing his mane come around.
That was when the lion picked Foster up sideways, shook her in his mouth, and turned her around. “Every single person on the crew was running in the opposite direction,” she continued. “And I’m like sideways watching everybody — and they took their equipment, too. I’m watching everybody leave going, ‘What’s happening.’”
Jodie Foster then heard the lion’s trainer say, “Drop it.” Because the lion was so trained, the animal opened his mouth and dropped her own. “I went running,” Foster declared. She also said that the lion came after. “[He] put one paw on me and then just waited like ‘I got her.’”
According to IMDb, Nepeloen and Samantha follows two young children, who, rather than part with an old pet lion who was once a circus performer, go on a rough mountain trek to stay with a recluse friend. Those who starred in the film alongside Foster were Michael Douglas, Johnny Whitaker, Will Greer, and Arch Johnson.
Natalie Portman Recently Said She Bonded With Jodie Foster Over ‘Being Sexualized as a Young Actress’
During the recent episode of the Smartless podcast, Star Wars star Natalie Portman spoke about how she and Jodie Foster bonded over being sexualized as a young actress.
“I talked to her much later,” Portman said about Foster. “Which was amazing. I did a speech at a women’s march about being sexualized as a young actress, and, she reached out to me after that, and we talked and it was amazing.”
Portman also said that Jodie Foster is still a role model to her. She then reflected on putting her guard up when it came to the entertainment industry. “I feel like it’s still surprising that it exists,” she said. “But I feel like that projection of seriousness protected me in a way because I feel like it was almost like a warning signal, like ‘Oh, don’t do s–t to her.’ Not that anyone ever like, you know, deserves it or is asking for it, but I felt like that was my unconscious way of doing it.”