Mia Wasikowska, born in Canberra, Australia, trained to be a dancer as a young girl, but gave up a promising career at the age of 15 in order to pursue acting.

Her first break came in 2004 when she was cast in two episodes of the Australian soap opera, All Saints. She then appeared in several Australian films, including Suburban Mayhem, which earned her a Young Actor's Award nomination by the Australian Film Institute.

Some of the blonde beauty's key movie roles since then include playing a Jew hiding in the forests of Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe in Defiance with Daniel Craig, and a young fan of Amelia Earhart's in the biopic Amelia, starring Hilary Swank. But Wasikowska is perhaps best known for her work in the HBO drama In Treatment. Playing Sophie, a suicidal gymnast seeking help from a therapist (Gabriel Byrne), Wasikowska made entertainment critics take note of her great talent. She was able to create a character so memorable that the New York Times listed her portrayal of Sophie as one of the most riveting performances of the 2008 television season and saw her listed as one of the top ten actors to watch in 2008 by Variety Magazine.

In 2008, Wasikowska beat out several actresses for the chance to fall down the rabbit hole as the lead character in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland — the much-anticipated 3-D fantasy co-starring Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter. Next, she adopted a British accent to play Charlotte Brontë's classic heroine, Jane Eyre, alongside Michael Fassbender, followed by Oscar winner Albert Nobbs and the western Lawless.

Other important roles for the actress included a daughter to Julianne Moore and Annette Bening in The Kids Are All Right and portraying Robyn Davidson in Tracks, based off the popular book.

The actress, who is of Polish descent, admits that she liked to mimic people as a child and was able to adopt an impressive American accent through watching American television in Australia.

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