Jodie Foster Sticks Up for Kristen Stewart, Blasts Media Culture

On the heels of her quasi firing from the Snow White and the Huntsman sequel, Kristen Stewart could use all the support she can get.

And she now has some from one of the most respected actresses in Hollywood.

Oscar winner Jodie Foster has penned an editorial for The Daily Beast in which stands up for her Panic Room costar - the pair appeared in that 2001 thrilled when Stewart was 11 - and slams the celebrity-obsessed media culture, which likes to "life up beautiful young people like gods and then pull them down to earth to gaze at their seams."

Foster, who has acted since the age of three, writes:

"If I were a young actor today I would quit before I started. If I had to grow up in this media culture, I don’t think I could survive it emotionally... Would I drown myself in drugs, sex, and parties? Would I be lost?"

Foster never cites Kristen's affair with Rupert Sanders. She refrains from commenting on this specific scandal.

Instead, she takes a larger view at what the 24/7 news channels, supermarket tabloids and blogosphere have created, saying the constant attention makes it difficult for an actor to give a "truthful" performance because he or she is always on guard. It's impossible to be "fearful" in the face of such a barrage.

"How can you do that if you know you will be personally judged, skewered, betrayed? If you’re smart, you learn to willfully disassociate, to compartmentalize. Putting your emotions into a safety box definitely comes in handy when the public throws stones."

Sounds a lot like the public persona Stewart gives off, doesn't it? She's never looked comfortable in the spotlight. How come?

"She’s learned," writes Foster. "She keeps her head down, her shades on, fists in her pockets. Don’t speak. Don’t look. Don’t cry."

Foster concludes with advice for her young, troubled friend:

The public horrors of today eventually blow away. And yes, you are changed by the awful wake of reckoning they leave behind. You trust less. You calculate your steps. You survive. Hopefully in the process you don’t lose your ability to throw your arms in the air again and spin in wild abandon. That is the ultimate F.U. and--finally--the most beautiful survival tool of all. Don’t let them take that away from you.