Cate Blanchett

Catherine Élise Blanchett was born on 14 May 1969 in the Melbourne suburb of Ivanhoe. Her Australian mother, June (née Gamble), was a property developer and teacher; and her American father, Robert DeWitt Blanchett Jr., a Texas native, was a United States Navy Chief Petty Officer who became an advertising executive. They met when Robert's ship broke down in Melbourne. When Blanchett was ten, her father died of a heart attack, leaving her mother to raise the family. Blanchett is the second of three children, with an older brother and younger sister. Her ancestry includes English, some Scottish, and remote French roots.

Blanchett has described herself as a "part extrovert, part wallflower" child. During her teenage years she had a penchant for dressing in traditionally masculine clothing, and went through goth and punk phases, at one point shaving her head. She attended primary school in Melbourne at Ivanhoe East Primary School; for her secondary education, she attended Ivanhoe Girls' Grammar School and then Methodist Ladies' College, where she explored her passion for the performing arts. In her late teens and early twenties, she worked at a nursing home in Victoria. After high school, she began a Bachelor of business administration at the University of Melbourne. While in Egypt, Blanchett was asked to be an extra as an American cheerleader in the Egyptian boxing film Kaboria (1990); in need of money, she accepted the job. On returning to Australia, she moved to Sydney and enrolled at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), graduating in 1992 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts.