It feels like just yesterday that Anna Paquin was a gobsmacked 11-year-old accepting the Oscar for her supporting role in The Piano. But now the Kiwi star’s celebrity status is rising so fast, she’s become the latest target for the Hollywood rumour mill.
After announcing her engagement to True Blood co-star Stephen Moyer last month, there were whispers that the 27-year-old was pregnant when she was spotted wearing a baggy black dress on the streets of Hollywood.
But her recent trapeze lesson with Stephen (39) and his daughter Lilac (7), from a previous relationship, has silenced pregnancy rumours – there’s no sign of a baby bump under Anna’s tight black acrobat outfit, and her stomach was strapped tightly into the harness.
Anna and Stephen have also spent the week searching for a family home to share with Lilac and Stephen’s son Billy (9). “I’m enjoying the prospect of doing up a house,” says Anna. “I’ve never decorated anywhere I’ve lived before.” And they’ve chosen the Californian seaside neighbourhood of Venice Beach as their hunting ground because, she says, “it reminds me of home in New Zealand.”
Anna is keen to make the most of the next chapter of her life by planning to practise her hobbies – photography and yoga – by the beach. Her newest role, as stepmother to Stephen’s kids, also suggests a newfound maturity.
“I had to learn quickly how to behave like an adult in an adult world,” she says. It’s been 18 years since The Piano, and in that time, self-confessed shy girl Anna has earned a reputation as a hard worker through starring roles in 23 films, including the X-Men trilogy, Almost Famous and 25th Hour. “I was never overexposed and work never became a chore,” she explains, when asked about her success. “I was a good girl who wanted to do a good job.”
The nearly-wed actress says she’s not planning to rush into having a baby of her own. She’s satisfied playing the role of Sookie Stackhouse, her exuberant character in the hit vampire show that screens here on Prime. “I don’t know how they’d deal with me and my short shorts on the show with a baby bump!” laughs Anna. “At some point, when that convenient time, which never exists for actresses, comes – somewhere between now and menopause – I will have babies,” the actress says.
Instead, she is focusing her energy on True Blood, a job made all the easier because of her leading man. “The better you know the person, the more open and real your performance can be,” she says of working with Stephen. And Anna doesn’t have any qualms about her more risque scenes. “I don’t think a naked body is shocking or interesting – it’s not the culture I was raised in. I was not brought up in the United States. I don’t share the attitude that graphic violence is okay, but God forbid you might see someone’s nipples! “I’m sorry, maybe there are a lot of women who keep their bras on while they have sex.”
