Anna Paquin

Anna Paquin is the star of several major motion pictures, including her first Oscar winning performance in The Piano (1993), the role of the young Jane in the 1996 film Jane Eyre (1996), and the role of Amy Alden in the charming family film, Fly Away Home (1996). With a well-developed vocabulary and gentle sense of humor, Paquin proves herself to be the most enchanting young talent working today. Paquin's rising stardom has often been a cause of charming media shyness, where it is obvious that she is an ordinary girl who happens to posses an extraordinary talent. She has two agents, Gail Cowan in New Zealand, and the William Morris agency in Los Angeles, but neither these nor her parents have much influence in deciding what she films. "In the end", she says, "it's my decision". Paquin's parents separated while she was filming Fly Away Home (1996) in Canada. On Oscar night in 1993, Anna Paquin was the surprise (and surprised) winner of the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She stood, wide-eyed and gulping for breath at the microphone for a full twenty-something-odd seconds before delivering a gracious, though rather breathless thank-you speech.

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 is now a student at Columbia University, has moved to New York City and has begun a new career as a stage actress appearing both in New York and London.