Alicia Christian Foster (born November 19, 1962), better known as Jodie Foster, is a two-time Academy Award-winning American actress, director, and producer.

She’s 45!

She has also won two Golden Globes, 3 BAFTA awards and a Screen Actors Guild Award, making her one of the few select actors to have won all four major motion picture acting awards (Oscars, Golden Globes, SAG, and BAFTA awards).

Foster was born to Lucius Foster III and Evelyn ‘Brandy’ (née Almond) Foster in Los Angeles, California. Her father, an Air Force colonel turned real estate broker, came from a wealthy background and left Foster’s family a few months before she was born. Foster’s mother supported the family by working as a film producer. She sent her daughter to an exclusive French-speaking prep school, the Lycée Français de Los Angeles, from which Foster graduated valedictorian before going to Yale University where she earned a B.A. in literature and graduated magna cum laude in 1985. While at Yale, Foster, like fellow 1985 Yale graduate Jennifer Beals of Flashdance fame, led a fairly normal life, considering her celebrity status. She would often spend time with friends at the local dive bar Anchor, and she occasionally partied in the haunts of one of the secret societies, the Manuscript Society (a scene recounting such an event is noted in Tom Perrotta’s novel Joe College).

Foster made nearly 50 film and television appearances before she attended college. She began her career at age three as the Coppertone Girl in a television commercial and debuted as a television actress in a 1968 episode of Mayberry R.F.D.

After appearing as a child in several commercials, Foster won her first role in the 1970 TV movie Menace on the Mountain, followed by several Disney productions. Foster did not experience her breakout role until 1976, when she received moderate recognition but great acclaim for her role as a pre-teenage prostitute in Taxi Driver, receiving an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

Foster was originally considered for the role of Princess Leia in Star Wars, but was unable to pull out of her contract with Disney.

She won an Oscar for Best Actress in 1988, for playing a rape victim in The Accused. In 1991, she starred in The Silence of the Lambs as Clarice Starling, a gifted FBI Agent investigating a serial killer. For this performance she received international acclaim and another Oscar for Best Actress. Her films and roles have spanned a wide variety of genres, including thrillers, crime, romance, comedy, children’s movies, and science fiction. Popular later films include the box office successes Contact (1997), Panic Room (2002), Flightplan (2005) and Inside Man (2006).

Due to her continual success as a headlining film star wielding enormous clout at the world wide box office, Jodie Foster is considered to have a much-envied Hollywood Midas touch.

Upcoming Projects:

Foster was set to direct, as well as reunite with actor Robert De Niro, for the film Sugarland. Ultimately the film was shelved indefinitely in 2007. Foster’s upcoming films include Nim’s Island, where she portrays a reclusive writer who is contacted by a young girl, played by Abigail Breslin, and the bio-flick, Leni Riefenstahl.

Personal Life:

Foster is intensely private about certain aspects of her personal life, notably her sexual orientation, which has been the subject of speculation. She is currently in a relationship with Cydney Bernard, her partner for over a decade, but has been reluctant to openly discuss any aspect of their relationship with the media.

She has two sons, Charles (b. 1998) and Kit (b. 2001); Foster has never identified or discussed their father.

Foster does not follow any “traditional religion,” but has “great respect for all religions” and enjoys reading religious texts. In an interview, she said she is an atheist.

Other November 19th Birthdays:

Larry King-Talk Show Host -74
Dick Cavett-Talk Show Host -71
Ted Turner-Media Mogul -69
Dan Haggerty-Actor -66
Kathleen Quinlan-Actress -53
Allison Janney-Actress -47
Meg Ryan-Actress -46
Terry Farrell-Actress -44