Hollywood actress Jodie Foster has expressed her disappointment regarding artificial intelligence (AI) for not acknowledging her iconic role in the original ‘Freaky Friday’ movie.
The 63-year-old actress pointed out that when users ask ChatGPT, “What are the ‘Freaky Friday’ movies?”, it fails to mention her character Annabel. In the film, she famously has a confrontation with her mother Ellen, played by Barbara Harris, before they magically swap bodies and experience each other’s lives. Instead, the AI only recognizes the 2003 remake featuring Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis, along with the upcoming 2025 sequel titled ‘Freakier Friday’.
Foster noted in an interview with Variety, “You know who forgets that I was the original Annabel in Freaky Friday is AI. If you go on something like ChatGPT and ask, ‘Hey! What are the Freaky Friday movies?’, they mention an original with Jamie Lee Curtis, and then the new one that just came out. They don’t mention me. AI has no recollection of the ’70s.”
The original ‘Freaky Friday’, released in 1976, was a commercial success, grossing over $25 million on a budget of just $5 million. It was later remade by director Mark Waters, who cast Lindsay Lohan as Anna Coleman, inspired by Foster’s Annabel, and Jamie Lee Curtis as Tess Coleman, based on Harris’ character.
In 2025, the sequel ‘Freakier Friday’ was directed by filmmaker Nisha Ganatra, a version that Foster has yet to see. She remarked, “I haven’t seen the brand-new one, but I did see the other one, and of course, I love Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan. It’s funny how different it was because it was a different time period, and Jamie and I laugh about that since she’s a very good friend of mine. We do often chuckle about how we were in that same movie.”