Trivia

In 2004, at 13 she became the youngest actress ever to be nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award.

During an interview with Jay Leno, she confessed she didn't know how to swim when she was cast in Whale Rider (2002).

Has been learning Maori dances since she was 6.

Discovered by the same agent who discovered Anna Paquin.

First Indigenous performer to be nominated for a Best Actress Oscar.

Spent seven hours in make-up for her cameo in Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005).

She was a fortunate discovery for Whale Rider (2002). The casting director and casting assistant went to her primary school in Mt Wellington, New Zealand and went through a few hundred children to choose their Paikea. They found her, only because she was playing up and being smart to them: she stood out.

She is the first female born in the 1990s to have received an Academy Award nomination for acting (for Whale Rider, receiving a Best Actress nomination for 2003's movie year). The first males born in the 1990s to have received an acting Oscar nomination were Lucas Hedges (for Manchester by the Sea (2016)) and Dev Patel (for Lion (2016)), both thirteen years after Keisha's nomination, while the first person born in the decade to have been nominated for Best Actor is Timothée Chalamet, for Call Me by Your Name (2017).

She is the daughter of Desrae Hughes and Tim Castle. Her father is Australian. Her mother is Maori, and also has some English ancestry.

Sailed on the Greenpeace ship MV Esperanza in the Cook Islands talking to people about climate change in June 2009.

Keisha has a daughter, Felicity-Amore Hull, who was born in April 2007, with former boyfriend Bradley Hull.

Has a life-long fear of dangerous birds, which she openly expressed in her Intrepid Journeys appearance to Tanzania, during the time she encountered several birds.

She often used to compete in and win speech competitions at school.

Is a fan of Johnny Depp; was able to meet him at the 76th Academy Awards when they were both nominees.

The first of two Oscar-nominated actors, and only woman, to join the cast of Game of Thrones (2011). She joined the cast in 2015 and twice Oscar-nominated actor Max von Sydow joined the cast in 2016. In 2017, the Oscar-winner Jim Broadbent joined the cast.

Shares the role of Mary, Jesus' mother, with Pernilla August. She and August have also both appeared in the Star Wars prequels.

She is the first millennial to have been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress (for Whale Rider, for 2003's movie year). Ryan Gosling, born in 1980, could be considered the first millennial nominated for the Best Actor Oscar (for Half Nelson (2006)). Eddie Redmayne and Natalie Portman are the first millennials to have won in those two respective categories.

As of 2018, she has never appeared in a Best Picture Oscar nominated film.