Anna Helene Paquin aka Anna biography

Real biography: Introduction

Anna Paquin waltzed into Hollywood when she was 11 years old, got a role in The Piano and won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for that breakthrough performance. Talk about setting the bar and winning your first race.

Life Story

Paquin's big-screen debut happened when she attended the open audition for Flora for The Piano along with her sister. The director was impressed by nine-year-old Paquin's performance of the monologue about Flora's father, and she was chosen from among the 5000 candidates.

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 movie among a wide audience. Paquin's debut performance in the film earned her an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at the age of eleven, making her the second-youngest Oscar winner in history after Tatum O'Neal.

The Piano was made as a small independent movie and wasn't intended to be widely known, and Paquin and her family didn't plan to continue in the acting circles. However, she was invited to the prestigious William Morris Agency, and she kept receiving offers for new roles. She systematically refused them, but she did appear in three commercials for the phone company MCI (now Verizon). She also appeared as a voice in an audio book entitled The Magnificent Nose in 1994.

In 1996, she appeared in two movies. 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 several small films, such as A Walk on the Moon, The Member of the Wedding, Amistad, Hurlyburly and She's All That with Rachael Leigh Cook.

Paquin gained more worldwide prominence with her role as Rogue in the blockbuster X-Men movie in 2000, its sequel X2: X-Men United in 2003, and its third installment X-Men: The Last Stand in 2006. She starred alongside Famke Janssen, Halle Berry and Rebecca Romijn.

In the summer of 2006, she completed filming Blue State which she also executive-produced, after she and her older brother, producer Andrew Paquin, formed the production company Paquin Films.[10] In November 2006, she completed Margaret. This film is now scheduled for release in 2009, according to imdb.com.

In 2007, Paquin received an Emmy Award nomination for Supporting Actress In A Miniseries Or A Movie for her role as Elaine Goodale in the HBO's made-for-TV movie Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, based on Dee Brown's bestseller. She also received Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild nominations in similar categories.

In 2008, Paquin appeared as Sookie Stackhouse in the HBO series True Blood, her first role in a TV series. The show is based on The Southern Vampire Mysteries series of novels by Charlaine Harris.

According to imdb.com, it is rumoured she is working on a new film, Metamorphosis.