Anna Paquin

Anna Paquin (born 24 July 1982) is a Canadian and New Zealand actress.

Paquin was born on 24 July 1982 in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Her mother, Mary (Brophy), is a New Zealand English teacher from Wellington; and her Canadian father, Brian Paquin, was then a physical education teacher.

She is the youngest of three children, with a brother, Andrew, who is a filmmaker, and a sister, Katya.

All her maternal great-grandparents emigrated from Ireland due to the Great Famine.

Her father is of Dutch and French descent.

The family moved to Wellington when she was four.

While in New Zealand, Paquin attended Raphael House Rudolf Steiner School and Hutt Intermediate School, both in Lower Hutt.

Her parents divorced when she was 12.

She received her secondary education at Wellington Girls' College.

Born in Winnipeg and raised in Wellington, Paquin made her acting debut portraying Flora McGrath in the romantic drama film The Piano (1993), for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at age 11, making her the second-youngest winner in Oscar history.

When The Piano was released in 1993 it was lauded by critics, won prizes at a number of film festivals, and eventually became a popular film among a wide audience.

Paquin's debut performance in the film earned her the 1994 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at the age of 11, making her the second-youngest Oscar winner in history, behind Tatum O'Neal.

The Piano was made as a small independent film and was not expected to be widely known, and Paquin and her family did not plan to continue to pursue acting.

However, she was invited to the William Morris Agency, and she kept receiving offers for new roles.

She systematically rejected them, but she did appear in three commercials for the phone company MCI in 1994.

She later made a series of television commercials for Manitoba Telecom Systems in her birth city of Winnipeg.

She also appeared as a voice in an audiobook entitled The Magnificent Nose in 1994.

As a child actress, she received multiple Young Artist Award nominations for her roles in Fly Away Home (1996), The Member of the Wedding (1997), and A Walk on the Moon (1999), and a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for appearing in Cameron Crowe's comedy drama film Almost Famous (2000).

She also appeared in the films Jane Eyre (1996) and Amistad (1997).

In 1996, she appeared in two films.

The first role was as young Jane in Jane Eyre.

The other was a lead part in Fly Away Home playing a young girl who, after her mother dies, moves in with her father and finds solace in taking care of orphaned goslings.

As a teenager, she had roles in other films, including A Walk on the Moon, Finding Forrester, Amistad, Hurlyburly, She's All That and Almost Famous as well as the English dub of Castle in the Sky.

Paquin continued to perform prominent roles into adulthood, portraying Rogue in the 20th Century Fox X-Men franchise (2000–2014), for which she was nominated for a Saturn Award for her performance in the first installment.

After moving to the U.S. at 16, she attended Windward School in Los Angeles, from which she graduated in 2000.

She studied at Columbia College for one year, where she lived in Carman Hall, but dropped out to continue her acting career.

Director Jane Campion was looking for a little girl to play a main role in The Piano, set to film in New Zealand, and a newspaper advertisement was run announcing an open audition.

Paquin's sister read the ad and went to try out with a friend; this inspired Paquin to audition.

When Campion met Paquin—whose only acting experience had been as a skunk in a school play—she was very impressed with the nine-year-old's performance of the monologue about Flora's father, and she was chosen from among the 5000 candidates.

Paquin played the mutant superhero Rogue in the Marvel Comics movie X-Men in 2000, its sequel X2 in 2003, and its third installment, X-Men: The Last Stand, in 2006.

Her other film credits include 25th Hour (2002), Trick 'r Treat (2007), Margaret (2011), The Good Dinosaur (2015), and The Irishman (2019).

Between 2006 and 2007, she starred in, as well as executive-produced Blue State.

The film is made by Paquin Films, a production company formed by her and her brother, Andrew.

In November 2006, she completed the film Margaret, which was released in 2011.

She played Elaine Goodale in HBO's made-for-TV film Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, based on Dee Brown's best-seller, garnering a Primetime Emmy Award nomination.

Among other accolades, Paquin was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award for her work on the television film Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (2007).

She played the lead role of Sookie Stackhouse in the HBO vampire drama television series True Blood (2008–2014).

For her performance in the series, Paquin won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in 2009, and was nominated for an additional Golden Globe Award, as well as three Saturn Awards and a Screen Actors Guild Award, in 2010.

She received an additional Golden Globe Award nomination for her work on the television film The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler (2009).