Jodie Foster has revealed that she came perilously close to starring as one of the most iconic characters in film history.

The actress, 61, has shared that she was cast in the original Star Wars series as Princess Leia, but had to turn it down because she was already playing a role in a Disney movie.

Appearing on this week’s Graham Norton Show to speak about her latest role in True Detective, she admitted that her life could have been completely different if she had not turned the science fiction role down.

Carrie Fisher went onto star as the Princess in the original Stars Wars trilogy, and reprised her role in The Force Awards before her death in 2016, with her final scenes airing posthumously in The Last Jedi in 2017 and The Rise Of Skywalker in 2019.

Jodie – who was joined on Graham’s couch by Olivia Colman, Lorraine Kelly, Wanda Sykes, Austin Butler, Josh Brolin, Calvin Harris and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man – was recently nominated for an Academy Award for the first time in nearly 30 years.

Jodie Foster, 61, revealed that the rumours are true. She was cast in the original Star Wars series as Princess Leia but had to turn down the famous role because she was already playing a role in a Disney movie

Appearing on this week’s Graham Norton show to speak about her latest role in True Detective, she admitted that her life could have been completely different if she had not turned the science fiction role down (pictured with L to R Austin Butler, Josh Brolin, Olivia Colman, Lorraine Kelly, Wanda Sykes Rag ‘n’ Bone Man and Calvin Harris)

The two-time Oscar winner – who last received a nod in 1995 for Nell – was recognised in the Best Supporting Actress category for her role in Nyad.

Now Jodie (as Liz Danvers) is joined by Kali Reis (as Evangeline Navarro) to form True Detective’s first all-female leading duo, as they solve a mystery of vanishing researchers over a 24-hour time-frame.

HBO‘s description says that the pair ‘will have to confront the darkness themselves, and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice.’

Talking about starring in the new season of TV drama True Detective, Jodie said: Night Country as detective Liz Danvers, said, ‘She is just awful; everything you can hate – racist, selfish, and very horny.

‘I can’t say much about the final episode, but it is the best, it is extraordinary. No one sees that end coming.’

‘I got the part of Princess Leia but couldn’t do it because I was already doing a Disney film,’ she added.

‘My life could have been so different, and I would have liked to have had the hair!’

The screen icon will face off on March 10 against Emily Blunt, Oppenheimer, Danielle Brooks, The Color Purple, America Ferrera, Barbie and Da’Vine Joy Randolph, The Holdovers.

Jodie said: ‘I got the part of Princess Leia (pictured being played by Carrie Fisher) but couldn’t do it because I was already doing a Disney film. My life could have been so different, and I would have liked to have had the hair!’

Now Jodie (as Liz Danvers) is joined by Kali Reis (as Evangeline Navarro) to form True Detective’s first all-female leading duo, as they solve a mystery of vanishing researchers over a 24-hour time-frame

HBO ‘s description says that the pair ‘will have to confront the darkness themselves, and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice.’

Her Nyad co-star Annette Bening, 65, landed her fourth Best Actress nomination for the film, having previously been nominated in the category for American Beauty, Being Julia and The Kids Are Alright.

She was also previously nominated in the Best Supporting Actress category for The Grifter.

Nyad follows the journey of long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad as she attempts a 100-mile ocean swim from Havana, Cuba to Key West, Florida.

Annette plays Nyad who originally gained fame when she swam 28 miles around Manhattan in 1975 at age 26 and for her 102 mile swim in 1979 at age 30 from the Bahamas to Juno Beach, Florida.

The film is based on Diana Nyad’s 2015 memoir, Find A Way. It follows the 64-year-old swimming legend on her quest to achieve her lifelong dream of competing a 110-mile open ocean swim from Cuba to Florida.

Jodie plays Bonnie Stoll, her friend and coach, who alongside a sailing team, guides Nyad on her four year journey to become the first person to complete the swim without the help of a shark cage.

Foster won her first Oscar as a 27-year-old for her lead role in The Accused in 1989 – winning the Best Actress award. She had landed her first Oscar nomination aged just 15 for Best Supporting Actress for Taxi Driver in 1977.

In 1992 she won in this category again for her role as rookie FBI agent Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs, which also won co-star Anthony Hopkins the Best Actor award – along with Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay.

Days before her nomination, Jodie revealed why she didn’t tell her kids she was a Hollywood star while they were growing up.

‘I guess I just didn’t want them to know me that way,’ she said on The View in January. ‘I wanted them to know me as their mom and the person who went away to work and stuff.’

‘I just didn’t want them to be confused about what I did for a living,’ she added.

The Silence of the Lambs alum then hilariously recalled what her older son, Charles, 25, believed she did when she brought him to a film set every day.

‘And I was like, ‘Yeah, and this is this set and this set and this set’. And for a really long time, he thought I was a construction worker. He thought I did construction’.

Jodie was recently nominated for an Academy Award for the first time in nearly 30 years after she was recognised in the Best Supporting Actress category for her role in Nyad

Her Nyad co-star Annette Bening, 65, landed her fourth Best Actress nomination for the film which follows the journey of long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad

With both Charles and her younger son, Christopher ‘Kit’, 22, now adults, Jodie was asked about whether she has watched any of her films with them.

‘They have no interest in watching my movies with me. I think they’re going to catch True Detective ’cause they’re really into that,’ she said of her HBO series.

‘There’s a few films that I would never show them because I would be worried about being teased, like Nell for example, they’ve never seen because they do tease me often about that, even though they’ve never seen the movie.’

Jodie shares her two sons with her former partner, Cydney Bernard. Foster is their biological mother, the biological father’s identity has not been made public.

Following their separation in 2008, the actress tied the knot with Alexandra Hedison in 2014.