Rachel McAdams was born in St. Thomas, just a few miles south of London, Ontario. When she was four, she took up figure skating and competed throughout high school. However, she knew that she wanted to be an actor one day and attended summer theater camp as well as appearing in school plays. In 1995, she received an acting award for her role in the one-act high school play I Live in a Little Town when it was presented at the prestigious Ontario Showcase at the Sears Drama Festival. McAdams went on to study theater at York University in Toronto, where she appeared in numerous stage and student film productions. During her senior year, she played a child in The Piper, a workshop led by a creative team from Toronto's Necessary Angel Theatre Company.
