Before they were stars, they were just kids from Vancouver Island. Many of Canada’s biggest celebrities come from our biggest cities, like Vancouver or Toronto, but you may be shocked to find that British Columbia’s largest island has quite a crop of superstar personalities. With some more well-known and some obscure, the list of VI celebs compiled below may surprise you.
Nelly Furtado
As anyone from Victoria will tell you, Nelly Furtado deserves the first spot on this list. Born and raised in Victoria, she’s island royalty. Nelly Furtado is best known for her songs that shaped 2000s pop music. She brought the world hits like “Maneater,” “I’m Like a Bird,” and “Promiscuous” which you’ve probably heard countless times on the radio or in the club. Furtado “has sold over 45 million records, including 35 million in album sales worldwide, making her one of the most successful Canadian artists.”
Nelly was born in Victoria as the third and final child of two Portuguese immigrant parents, Maria Manuela and António José Furtado. Her music career began young, with her learning to sing in Portuguese at the age of 4. As she grew up, so did her musical aspirations—she even learned new instruments and joined a Portuguese marching band. After graduating from Mount Douglas Secondary School in Saanich, Furtado moved to Toronto in 1996, where her music was inevitably discovered.
Mac DeMarco
Canadian singer-songwriter Mac DeMarco is another Vancouver Island local. Though he was raised in Edmonton, Alberta, DeMarco was born in 1990, in Duncan, British Columbia. DeMarco is best known for his Indie-Rock songs, including, “Chamber of Reflection” and “Salad Days”.
In 2023, DeMarco released a road-trip album entitled Five Easy Hot Dogs, featuring tracks for many cities around the United States and Canada, with GPS coordinates to match. Though he didn’t have a song for his birthplace of Duncan, he did include one entitled “Victoria,” with the coordinates showing Victoria’s Fairmount Express (48.421463266873985, -123.36792166949526), which is suspected to be where he composed the instrumental track.
Calum Worthy
When the crowd wants more, Calum Worthy brings on the thunder (IYKYK). Another born-and-raised Victorian celebrity is 33-year-old actor Calum Worthy. He is best known for his roles as Dez in Disney Channel’s Austin and Ally and Gypsy Rose’s murderous boyfriend, Nicholas Godejohn, in The Act.
Worthy’s acting career began young, at the age of 13. Still, he continued to reside in Victoria, attending Claremont Secondary School in Saanich until he graduated. Post-graduation he moved to Los Angeles to attend University and film the television show, Austin and Ally.
Pamela Anderson
Actress and model Pamela Anderson was born in 1967 in the small town of Ladysmith, located close to Nanaimo. Anderson attended school in Comox at Highland Secondary School, where she graduated before moving to Vancouver. She is by far one of the biggest celebrities from Vancouver Island, known for her record-holding number of appearances in Playboy and her prominent role as Casey Jean (C.J.) in the television show Baywatch.
In 2023, Anderson sold her house in Miami and permanently moved to her grandmother’s property that she inherited in Ladysmith. The HGTV production Pamela’s Garden of Eden, documents the full restoration and renovation of the property to prepare for Anderson and her family’s move.
Steve Nash
For all the sports fans out there, basketball Hall of Famer, current coach, and former gym namesake, Steve Nash was raised in Victoria, British Columbia. Moving from his birthplace of Johannesburg, South Africa at 18 months old, he spent the rest of his formative years on Vancouver Island. It was at the Victoria high school of St. Michaels University School (SMUS), that Nash created a name for himself in basketball.
Nash was then scouted to play on scholarship at California’s Santa Clara University post-graduation. He was later drafted in 1996 to play in the NBA for the Phoenix Suns, the Dallas Mavericks, and the Los Angeles Lakers. In 2015, he retired from professional basketball and began a coaching career that is still ongoing today.
Nash was a highly awarded player, he’s a two-time MVP winner, was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2018, and even received an honourary Doctorate of Laws from the University of Victoria in 2008.