Father left to run medical clinics in the Congo (later Zaire) for Moral Rearmament when Close was 13

Began performing with repertory group, Fingernails, then toured country with conservative folk-singing group, Up With People for five years before college

Joined Phoenix Theatre Company in NYC and made Broadway debut in their production of "Love for Love"

Broadway musical debut as Mary Tudor in the Richard Rodgers-Sheldon Harnick show "Rex"

TV-movie debut in "Too Far to Go" (NBC)

Portrayed Charity Barnum in the stage musical biography "Barnum"; earned first Tony Award nomination; also appeared in the show's national tour

Screen acting debut in "The World According to Garp"; received first of three consecutive Oscar nominations as Best Supporting Actress

Played lead role in the Off-Broadway production "The Singular Life of Albert Nobbs"

Garnered second Academy Award nomination for "The Big Chill"

Co-starred with Ted Danson in the ground-breaking ABC TV-movie about incest "Something About Amelia"

Earned third Oscar nomination for her turn as Robert Redford's girlfriend in "The Natural"

Dubbed Andie MacDowell's dialogue in "Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes"

Returned to Broadway as co-star of Tom Stoppard's "The Real Thing"; directed by Mike Nichols and co-starred Jeremy Irons; won first of three Tony Awards

First leading film roles, "Jagged Edge" and "Maxie"

Co-starred with William Hurt in the staging of the oratorio "Joan of Arc at the Stake" in NYC

Appeared on Broadway opposite Sam Waterston in "Benefactors"

Changed image by playing the psychotic Alex in "Fatal Attraction"; earned first Best Actress Academy Award nomination

Associate produced first project (a documentary; also narrated), "Do You Mean There Are Still Real Cowboys?" for PBS, the "American Experience" series

Received fifth Oscar nomination and second as Best Actress playing the manipulative Marquise de Merteuil in "Dangerous Liaisons"

Cast opposite Jeremy Irons as Sunny von Bulow in "Reversal of Fortune"

Played Gertrude to Mel Gibson's "Hamlet"; directed by Franco Zeffirelli

First TV-movie as executive producer (also starred in the title role), "Sarah, Plain and Tall" on "Hallmark Hall of Fame"; received Emmy nomination

Made cameo appearance as a male pirate in Steven Spielberg's "Hook"

First Broadway role in six years, "Death and the Maiden"; co-starred with Richard Dreyfuss and Gene Hackman; won second Tony Award

Reprised the role of Sarah in the sequel "Skylark" (CBS)

Returned to the musical stage as Norma Desmond in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical version of "Sunset Boulevard"; first played the role in the L.A. production; chosen by Lloyd Webber to star in the Broadway version instead of Patti LuPone who originated the role in London; garnered third Tony Award

Earned a Best Actress Emmy playing Colonel Margarethe Cammermeyer who disclosed her lesbianism in NBC's "Serving in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer Story"; also executive produced

Cast as First Lady to Jack Nicholson's President in "Mars Attacks!"

Portrayed Cruella de Vil in the live-action Disney film, "101 Dalmatians"

Delivered a delicately nuanced turn as a mother whose son has returned home to die in the HBO movie "In the Gloaming"; directed by Christopher Reeve; received another Emmy nomination

Played the US Vice President coping with a hostage crisis involving the First Family in "Air Force One"

Starred as an eccentric Southerner in Robert Altman's "Cookie's Fortune"

Reprised role of Sarah in "Sarah, Plain and Tall: Winter's End," the third installment for CBS and "Hallmark Hall of Fame"

Reprised role of Cruella de Vil in "102 Dalmatians"

Portrayed Nelly Forbush in the small screen remake of "South Pacific" (ABC)

Recreated her Off-Broadway role in "Albert Nobbs" (lensed 2001); director Istvan Szabo's adaptation of the one-person stage play "The Singular Life of Albert Nobbs"

Produced and starred in the TNT original movie "Rachel Carson's Silent Spring"

Cast opposite Timothy Olyphant in "The Safety of Objects"; screened at Toronto Film Festival

Co-starred with Patrick Stewart in Showtime's remake of "A Lion in Winter," story by James Goldman; received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Actress in a Miniseries or Movie

Guest starring role as a potential Supreme Court justice on the NBC drama "The West Wing"

Cast opposite Nicole Kidman and Bette Midler in the remake of ''The Stepford Wives,'' Bryan Forbes' 1975 cult classic about upper-crust women being replaced by robots with sunny dispositions

Joined the cast of FX's "The Shield" in season four, playing the new captain of the Farmington precinct; earned Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress in a Drama Series

Appeared in Rodrigo Garcia's "Nine Lives," an ensemble feature about nine short, loosely intertwining tales

Cast as a ruthless litigator in the FX legal drama, "Damages"; earned a SAG nomination in 2008 for Best Actress in a Drama Series