I've never really been one of those girls who's scared of showing a bit of flesh.
— Anna Paquin
Sookie is always in distress, it wouldn't be 'True Blood' if someone wasn't trying to kill her.
When it's a love scene with someone you actually love, there's no feeling like, 'Can I touch him here? Can I touch him there?' You know what your boundaries are - or what they aren't, I suppose.
Frankly, no one had ever asked me before. My sexuality is something I'm completely comfortable with and open about.
None of the characters I've played are really like me. That would be boring. That wouldn't be acting.
I have a really, really, really normal family. And by normal I mean we're all nuts on some level. I think you've gotta be a little nuts to pursue any kind of creative job. I was also a really good kid. I know that sounds really dull, but I didn't rebel in the traditional sense.
I work out like a maniac and I spray tan a lot. Genetics were kind, but I work very hard.
I just do what feels right. I think the great thing about getting to do what I do is that you can try out being a different person without having to screw up your life to do it.
I was never overexposed and work never became a chore. I was a very good girl wanting to do a good job.
Just because I do what I do doesn't mean I escaped adolescence, all the bumps and bruises that go along with it.
I was honestly never a huge school person.
Sookie is about as radically different from me and a lot of the work I've previously done as you could possibly come up with.
I think it's an amazing quality to be able to roll with the punches and not be totally ruined as a person because life's been rough for you. That's a really admirable way to go through your life.
Well, the years from 10 to 20, when your body, mind and everything is like changing every five minutes, can be pretty torturing. And most of the interesting characters, I think, are somewhat tortured or torturous. I'm 20 now, so I'm only just an adult.
Maybe I'm misjudging people, but I feel like a lot of people still have an image of me in a bonnet at nine years old.
You gain and lose different things in different mediums or different sectors of different mediums. There are liberties you get on tiny indie films in terms of not having to be designed toward a marketing demographic.
Everything about being a teenager and not feeling like you fit in is just magnified by being a mutant!
I really liked the idea of focusing on one thing for, hopefully, a long time to come. I also like the idea of a consistent lifestyle, as opposed to not really knowing where on the planet you're going to be at any given moment.
I think, generally, most people can't maintain anything that's particularly strict for very long. I watch people trying and failing to do that a lot.
Stubborn people get themselves in a lot of trouble, but they also get things done.
Everyone is usually screwed up in some way and that is usually where the work comes in - figuring out how to make it believable and make it real to present someone's problems that you don't necessarily actually know anything about.
I'm Anna Paquin. I'm bisexual and I give a damn.
You find happiness where you find it.
I'm so organised. I never screw up. I've done it maybe twice before. I check my calendar seven times a day.
I still don't really think about acting that much. I just do it.
There's nothing more exciting as an actor than getting to do something that you're not entirely sure that anyone would let you do, and getting to take a big jump in a completely different direction.
I like shows or films or books that have messages but don't beat people over the head with them.
I don't know when acting came to be more about awards than about the work. Judging who's better than the other person shouldn't be part of why we're doing this job. It should be about entertaining people.
We all had to learn Southern accents. It wasn't a big research show. With the 'Wounded Knee' project, I locked myself in my apartment with history books so I would know what we're talking about.
My sexuality is something I'm completely comfortable with and open about. There's a lot of prejudice toward us but the more people talk about it, the less of a big deal it will be. And that will be better for everyone.
If I don't do laundry today, I'm gonna have to buy new clothes tomorrow.
While I have always, felt like an outsider, it's because of the professional choices I have made, so it's not like I am planning to throw myself a giant pity party.
I think that in itself is kind of an amazing achievement to be able to say that your full-time career is in any creative arts, let alone a show that has kept people interested for coming on four seasons and hopefully more.
Like most people my age, my job is the main focus of my life. I don't have some kind of jet-setting fabulous lifestyle where I'm constantly in situations to acquire amazing anecdotes, that's it.
There are very few films or plays or anything about really happy people with perfect lives.
I like a challenge.
I'm drawn to doing interesting stuff at work. And some of the time with the supernatural, you get to do really crazy, fun things. But I'm not a big genre-fantasy gal, particularly.
One hate crime is committed approximately every hour of every day in this country.
It's great to have the freedom to enjoy your work and not feel like you're leaving your other life behind.
I get paid to do the thing I love most, and maybe that makes blending into the crowd impossible sometimes, but I wouldn't trade it for the world.
I don't know what it is that I'm doing, but I'm really enjoying myself. And I'm free to do it as much as I want.
