Anna Paquin

Anna Paquin, the young Canadian who grew up in New Zealand and whose only acting experience was as a skunk at a school play, stunned movie-goers from all over the world with her performance as Holly Hunter’s angry young daughter in the acclaimed film The Piano (1993). Anna, who received an Oscar for her performance (the second youngest Oscar winner ever), has proven that The Piano (1993) was only the beginning of a fabulous career.

She starred in Carroll Ballard’s Fly Away Home (1996) and in Franco Zeffirelli’s Jane Eyre (1996). After her parents’ divorce, she moved to Los Angeles with her mother and sister in order to pursue more actively a career in acting. Soon enough, she made the transition from child-actress to teenage actress with her performance in Hurlyburly (1998) alongside Sean Penn, Kevin Spacey and Meg Ryan and in A Walk on the Moon (1999) alongside Diane Lane, Viggo Mortensen and Liev Schreiber. Paquin, who has become an expert at portraying troubled teenagers, then starred in the popular science fiction film, the X-Men (2000). The same year, 2000, she also appeared in films such as Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous (2000) and Gus Van Sant’s Finding Forrester (2000). Anna, who was a student at Columbia University, moved to New York City and began a new career as a stage actress appearing both in New York and London. —IMDb