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Hollywood icon Burt Reynolds still regrets posing nude for a women's magazine in the 1970s, as he feels the centerfold hurt his movie "Deliverance" when it came to the Academy Awards.

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The actor caused a stir and became a sex symbol in 1972 after he stripped down and posed naked on a bearskin rug for Cosmopolitan magazine. The photo was so popular among female readers it reportedly spawned Playgirl magazine, but Reynolds is convinced the commotion it caused had a negative effect on his "Deliverance" co-stars.

He tells U.K. TV show "Piers Morgan's Life Stories," "I really can't (look at it). I'm very embarrassed by it. I thought it cost some actors in 'Deliverance' an Academy Award. It did distract from ('Deliverance'), it distracted from a lot of things. It cost the film a lot. I mean, the film deserved more. (Jon) Voight was incredible. I think it hurt Jon. I think it hurt Ned Beatty. He certainly deserved an Oscar nomination. I think it hurt me, too. It was just the wrong timing." Reynolds is still proud of the 1972 thriller, saying, "I'm not sure it's my greatest acting performance, (but) I think it's my best film. By far my best film."