Anna Paquin is an accomplished actress who was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba to Brian and Mary Paquin.
Her mother, Mary, was an English teacher from Wellington, and her father, Brian Paquin, was a physical education teacher from Canada.
She is the youngest of three children, with a filmmaker brother, Andrew, and a sister, Katya, whose partner is former Green Party of New Zealand co-leader Russel Norman.
Because of the Great Famine, all of her maternal great-grandparents left Ireland. Her father is Dutch Mennonite with French ancestors. When she was four years old, her family relocated to Wellington.
Anna Paquin attended Raphael House Rudolf Steiner School and Hutt Intermediate School, both in Lower Hutt, while in New Zealand. When she was 12, her parents divorced.