Evan Rachel Wood

Wood was born in Raleigh, North Carolina on September 7, 1987. Her mother, Sara Lynn Moore, is an actress, director, and acting coach. Her father, Ira David Wood III, is an actor, theater director and playwright prominent in Raleigh, where he is the co-founder and executive director of a community theatre company called Theatre in the Park. Wood's brother, Ira David Wood IV, is also an actor; she has two other brothers, Dana and Thomas, and a sister named Aden. Her paternal aunt, Carol Winstead Wood, was a production designer in Hollywood.

Of having a traditionally masculine given name, Wood has said: "My mother had a dream that she was gonna have a daughter with blond hair and blue eyes named Evan, so that was just my name."

Wood was actively involved in Theatre in the Park while growing up, including an appearance in the 1987 production of her father's musical comedy adaptation of A Christmas Carol when she was just a few months old. She subsequently played the Ghost of Christmas Past in several productions there, and starred as Helen Keller alongside her mother (as Anne Sullivan) in The Miracle Worker, under her father's direction.

She attended Cary Elementary School in Cary, North Carolina, where she starred in its production of The Little Mermaid. When her parents divorced, she moved with her mother to her mother's native Los Angeles in 1997 to further her acting career. She attended public school in California before leaving at age 12 for homeschooling. She received her high school diploma at 15. Wood said she earned a black belt in taekwondo when she was 12, and that she participated in the AAU Junior Olympic Games.