GenQ - For the not so straight individual

While Jodie's sexual orientation has never been a big secret, the actress has vehemently defended her privacy and has never gone public with any indication of where she stands.

During a speech she gave after receiving an award at a Power 100 breakfast earlier in the week, the Golden Globe, Academy Award and double Oscar winner referred to her partner of almost 20 years Cydney Bernard publicly for the first time. Jodie thanked "my beautiful Cydney, who sticks with me through all the rotten and the bliss."

Jodie landed her first acting role when she was just 8 in Menace on the Mountain and has since starred in movies such as Taxi Driver, Silence of the Lambs, Panic Room, and more recently, The Brave One.

She has two sons, Charles Bernard Foster (b. 1998) and Kit Bernard Foster (b. 2001 to which Cynthia is co-parent. Jodie has never publicly identified or discussed their father.

If anything, this occurrence raises the issue, if you were emotionally and romantically linked to someone so closeted in that aspect of their private life, whether a celebrity or not, could you pretend for almost 20 years that you weren’t their partner, and manage to hold back the urge to show public affection?