| BIOGRAPHY
A precociously talented youngster, Helen Hunt was drawing paychecks
as a television actress from the age of ten. Before she was 17,
she had appeared as a regular on two series, Swiss Family Robinson
(1975) and The Fitzpatricks (1977). Hunt proved she was more than
just a workaday child actor with her starring performance in the
fact-based 1981 TV movie The Miracle of Kathy Miller, in which
she played a high school athlete who overcame severe mental and
physical damage brought on by a highway accident.
While she had been appearing in films as early as Rollercoaster
in 1977, Hunt was never groomed as a star player, and it is possible
that her resemblance to another child actress, Jodie Foster, held
her back from more important roles.
After taking on her first adult role in the 1982 sitcom It Takes
Two, Hunt's film assignments improved, with sizable roles in Girls
Just Want to Have Fun (1985), Peggy Sue Got Married (1986), Project
X (1987), Next of Kin (1989), and The Waterdance (1991). She also
gained a small measure of cult status by appearing in a brace
of science fiction films, including Trancers II (1991) and Trancers
III (1992). That same year, Hunt landed her longest-lasting acting
assignment to date, as the co-star of the Paul Reiser-created
comedy series Mad About You.
During the show's seven-year run, she won both Emmy and Golden
Globe awards for her portrayal of Jamie Buchman. In 1996, Hunt
had her most successful film role to date in the blockbuster Twister.
The following year, she topped that when she received a Best Actress
Oscar for playing a caring waitress and single mother who befriends
acerbic, obsessive-compulsive author Melvin Udall (Jack Nicholson,
who also won an Oscar for his performance) in As Good As It Gets.
After Mad About You ended in 1999, Hunt appeared in films by
several veteran directors, including Robert Zemeckis (Cast Away
[2000]), Robert Altman (Dr. T and The Women [2000]), and Woody
Allen (The Curse of the Jade Scorpion [2001]). She starred in
Life x 3 on Broadway in 2003. |
FILMOGRAPHY
• The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001)
• Cast Away (2000)
• Dr. T and the Women (2000)
• Pay It Forward (2000)
• What Women Want (2000)
• As Good as It Gets (1997)
• Twister (1996)
• Kiss of Death (1995)
• Bob Roberts (1992)
• Mr. Saturday Night (1992)
• Murder in New Hampshire (1992)
• Only You (1992)
• Trancers 3: Deth Lives (1992)
• The Waterdance (1992)
• Trancers 2: The Return of Jack Deth (1991)
• Dark River - A Father's Revenge (1990)
• Next of Kin (1989)
• The Frog Prince (1988)
• Project X (1987)
• Peggy Sue Got Married (1986)
• Girls Just Want to Have Fun (1985)
• Trancers (1985)
• Bill - On His Own (1983)
• Desperate Lives (1982)
• The Child Bride of Short Creek (1981)
• Pioneer Woman (1973) |
