Theatre Hunt was a well-known live-stage actress before she entered film and television. She made her Broadway debut in the 1975 revival of
Ah, Wilderness. She was nominated for the
Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for her work in the 1984 play
End of the World. She also received two ensemble Obie Awards for her work Off-Broadway in
Top Girls and
A Metamorphosis in Miniature. Hunt created the role of Aunt Dan in
Wallace Shawn's play
Aunt Dan and Lemon. She was a member of the
Long Wharf Theatre Company in Connecticut, where she performed the Player Queen in a production of
Hamlet, amongst other roles. She portrayed Sister Aloysius in the
Pasadena Playhouse production of
John Patrick Shanley's play
Doubt. Hunt was praised for her performance as the title character in
Bertolt Brecht's
Mother Courage and Her Children. She also appeared as Pope Joan in Caryl Churchill's
Top Girls when London's Royal Court Theatre's production was staged at the
Public Theater in New York. In an interview with writer Craig Gholson and actor Vincent Caristi, Hunt said: "Acting onstage is like an explosion each night. And what comes in at you all the time as you are trying to . . . create something which is a tremendous act of organization and concentration." Hunt made her film debut in 1980 in
Robert Altman's musical comedy
Popeye. Two years later, Hunt co-starred as Billy Kwan in
The Year of Living Dangerously,
Peter Weir's film adaptation of the
novel of the same name. For her work in this film, Hunt won the
Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1983, becoming the first person to win an Oscar for
playing a character of the opposite sex. In her screen test, Hunt wore a hairpiece, a fake moustache, and "paste-on pieces above her eyes to [appear] Asian." To play the role, Hunt had her hair dyed and cut short, had her eyebrows shaved, wore padding and makeup, and wore something in her shirt pocket. In her 1986 interview with the
Bomb magazine, Hunt remarked that Billy Kwan "is supra-personal [with] layers of sexual ambiguity[.]" Hunt also played the Shadout Mapes in
Dune (1984), a nurse in
She-Devil (1989), the austere school principal Miss Schlowski opposite
Arnold Schwarzenegger in
Kindergarten Cop (1990), and assassin Ilsa Grunt in
If Looks Could Kill (1991).
Television Hunt's television appearances include recurring roles as Judge Zoey Hiller on
David E. Kelley's series
The Practice and as Dr. Claire Bryson on
Without a Trace. She has narrated several installments of
The American Experience on
PBS. From 2009 to 2023, Hunt co-starred as Operations Manager
Henrietta "Hetty" Lange on the CBS television series
NCIS: Los Angeles. Her co-stars on the series included
Chris O'Donnell,
LL Cool J,
Daniela Ruah,
Eric Christian Olsen,
Miguel Ferrer and
Barrett Foa. Hunt was a main cast member on the series for twelve seasons, but was downgraded to a special guest star position in season thirteen as a safety precaution due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. She was supposed to return in the
series finale, but was unable to due to availability issues. As a result, her return was condensed to a voiceover. Hunt won two Teen Choice Awards for her work on
NCIS: Los Angeles.
Voice work Hunt is known for her husky voice. Hunt voiced the role of
Grandmother Willow in the animated musical film
Pocahontas (1995) Hunt narrated the
National Geographic documentary
The Great Indian Railway (1995). In 1998, she narrated the Discovery Channel documentary "Titanic: Untold Stories." Hunt's voice work also includes the character of Management in
Carnivàle (2003, 2005) and the narrator for
God of War video game series. She narrated a
PBS Nature special entitled
Christmas in Yellowstone (2006). ==Personal life==