Did Anna not live up to her potential as an actress?

https://www.quora.com/Which-child-actor-did-not-live-up-to-his-her-potential/answer/John-Gaunce

At age 11, she was the second youngest person to win an Oscar for acting. For context, the youngest was Tatum O’Neal when she was 10, and the next youngest to them was 16 years old, followed by people in their 20s. For my dollar, her Oscar was also well deserved, and she beat out such great actors as Piano costar and best actress winner Holly Hunter and Emma Thompson. The bar for future success was set incredibly high.

After such a noteworthy beginning filled with accolades, she took a few years off from acting. Returning in 1996, she was cast in small or middle sized roles by some of the most acclaimed directors, including Steven Spielberg, Franco Zeffirelli, Cameron Crowe and Gus Van Zant and along side Superstars like Sean Penn, Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins, Sean Connery and Kevin Spacey. These roles didn’t bring her much prestige or acclaim, but were certainly great roles for a young actor. The role that did bring her back into the limelight was Rogue from the X-men movies. In this film series her portrayal was fine, but it was certainly overshadowed by the likes of Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellan and Hugh Jackman. The other role that she is best known for is the lead in the HBO series “True Blood”, a popular series that received modestly positive critical reviews. She has been nominated for a number of less prestigious awards, and a few more prestigious ones, including one Emmy nomination and one SAG (four if you count ensemble awards). The highlight in terms of awards for her adult career was a Golden Globe award in 2009 for “True Blood”. She continues to be cast in film and TV, and recently appeared in Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman”.

If judged in terms of career dollars earned, the number of roles for someone of her age (51 acting credits on IMDB for someone who’s approaching 40 years old), or even by the quality of films she’s appeared in, she excels by all of these metrics. She’s a totally bankable actor who can look like she belongs on Major TV series’ or on any film set. Where she falls short of her potential is in outstanding individual performances. To my estimation, and the estimation of the aggregate opinions of critics, she’s not had an outstanding performance since she was 11 years old.