Early Life
Anne Hathaway was born November 12, 1982 in Brooklyn, New York. Her father, Gerald Thomas Hathaway, is a lawyer, and her mother, Kathleen Ann (née McCauley), is an actress who inspired Hathaway to follow in her footsteps. The family moved to Millburn, New Jersey, when she was six years old. Hathaway has an older brother, Michael, and a younger brother, Thomas. She is of mostly Irish and French ancestry, with distant Native American and German roots.
Hathaway was raised Catholic with what she considered "really strong values," and has stated she wanted to be a nun during her childhood. However, she decided against it at the age of 15, after learning her brother, Michael, was gay. "I realised my older brother was gay, and I couldn't support a religion that didn't support my brother. Now I call myself a nondenominational Christian, because I haven't found the religion for me." In 2009, Hathaway stated that her religious beliefs are "a work in progress."
As a preschooler, Hathaway attended Brooklyn Heights Montessori School. She entered first grade at the Wyoming Elementary School in Millburn while she was technically still a kindergartner. Hathaway graduated from Millburn High School, where she participated in many school plays; her high school performance as Winnifred in Once Upon a Mattress garnered her a Paper Mill Playhouse Rising Star Award nomination for Best Performance by a High School Actress. During this time, Hathaway was in plays including Jane Eyre and Gigi at New Jersey's Paper Mill Playhouse (which is located in Millburn, across the street from Hathaway's middle school). She spent several semesters studying as an English major and Women's Studies minor at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York before transferring to New York University's Gallatin School of Individualized Study, referring to her college enrollment as one of her best decisions, because she enjoyed being with others who were trying to "grow up." She also studied at the American Academy of Dramatic arts. Hathaway was the first teenager admitted into The Barrow Group Theater Company's acting program.
A soprano, Hathaway performed in 1998 and 1999 with the All-Eastern U.S. High School Honors Chorus at Carnegie Hall and has performed in plays at Seton Hall Preparatory School in West Orange, New Jersey. Three days after her 1999 performance at Carnegie Hall, she was cast in the short-lived Fox television series Get Real at the age of 16.
Hathaway is a trained stage actress and has stated that she prefers performing on stage to film roles. Her acting style has been compared with those of Judy Garland and Audrey Hepburn. She cites Garland as one of her favorite actresses and Meryl Streep as her idol.
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