Helen Hunt’s quiet life out of the highlight after Oscar winner, 62, went again to school and boycotted Botox whereas vowing to not ‘sacrifice’ herself to Hollywood
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Helen Hunt shot to fame with her role as Jamie Buchman in the 90s hit sitcom Mad About You.
She went on to earn three Golden Globe Awards, an Oscar and four Primetime Emmy Awards, cementing her status as one of TV’s most recognisable stars.
But by the mid-2000s, her presence in the spotlight had begun to quieten as she didn’t want to ‘sacrifice’ herself to the fast-paced world of Hollywood.
While she never stopped working – even securing another Academy Award nomination in 2013 for her role in The Sessions – the heights of her earlier fame became less central to her career.
Today, Helen, 62, leads a far more low-key life, which includes balancing acting and directing, with a much more grounded lifestyle.
As she reflected to The Guardian in 2019: ‘It’s so funny when people ask, “What happened to you?”… There’s a difference between working hard and being famous.’
Helen Hunt shot to fame with her role as Jamie Buchman in the 90s hit sitcom Mad About You (pictured last year)
But by the mid-2000s, her presence in the spotlight had begun to quieten as she didn’t want to ‘sacrifice’ herself to the fast-paced world of Hollywood (pictured last year)
Helen Pictured in Mad About You with Paul Reiser
This week, Helen made a rare public appearance at the Stella McCartney show during Paris Fashion Week.
She was joined by her daughter Makena Lei, 21, whom she shares with her former partner, producer Matthew Carnahan.
Looking incredibly chic at the event, Helen showed off just how stunning natural ageing can be.
The star has made it clear that she refuses to conform to Hollywood’s beauty standards and has had no surgery or Botox after struggling with the ‘misery and shame’ she felt in her youth.
‘It felt impossible not to internalise the way you’re supposed to look. And [there was] a certain amount of misery and shame around not looking exactly that way,’ she told Flow Space last year.
Helen realised that the beauty standards were affecting her self-esteem, but decided not to allow outside pressures to damage her mental health.
The What Women Want star said: ‘I realised, “This could quietly ruin your whole life.” I made a decision: I’m not playing. Not gonna [let it] take up a lot of space in my mind.’
While public appearances like this are few and far between for Helen these days, the actress was once one of Hollywood’s most recognisable stars.
But after winning an Oscar in 1997 with her role as Carol Connelly in As Good As It Gets, she began to consider how famous she really wanted to be.
She decided to take a break from filming after the movie and didn’t return to the screen until 2000.
‘It just felt time to take a few years off,’ Helen shared with Female.com.au at the time.
After a short break, the star came back with a bang, bagging major roles in the years that followed.
‘Everybody around you says, “But you’ve worked so hard to get to this point, what is your follow-up thing?” But you can’t control whether something wonderful comes along after something like [the Oscar win] happens,’ she told Female.com.au.
This week, Helen made a rare public appearance at the Stella McCartney show during Paris Fashion Week. She was joined by her daughter Makena Lei, 21, whom she shares with her former partner, producer Matthew Carnahan
Helen was with Matthew for 16 years before their break up in 2017
Helen found love again with actor Jeffrey Nordling
She went on to appear in Cast Away, Pay it Forward, and What Women Want, among many others.
But Helen became slightly uneasy with the level of attention that came with fame.
‘There were a couple of years when I was a little spooked,’ she told The Guardian in 2022. ‘I was afraid that I could never unring that bell.’
She took another acting break between 2001 and 2004. When she returned, the roles were fewer and further between.
She later told The New York Times that it was hard to find roles that interested her as much as the promise of family time, after welcoming her daughter Makena in 2004.
The star told the publication: ‘I suddenly wasn’t offered parts that were worth walking away from the most compelling thing I’d ever been involved with, which was my family.
‘Maybe my dirty little secret is this is the life I’d been wanting.’
Between 2004 and 2010, Helen appeared in just four films and one TV show, which included Oscar Wilde period drama A Good Woman, Bobby, her own directorial debut Then She Found Me, and the comedy Every Day with Liev Schreiber.
In 2011, she explained to Vulture that she had simply become more selective about projects over the years.
‘Movie acting is a great job for your twenties: You travel all over, you have affairs with people, and you throw yourself into one part and then another,’ she said. ‘It gets more challenging as you get older… it’s wanting to have your own life and be yourself.’
‘I’m too grown up. That’s when choosing becomes really important,’ she added.
Helen studied drama at university throughout her adulthood, but went back to college to further her education.
She admitted to Redbook in 2008: ‘I’m taking a philosophy class and regretting it with everything in me.
‘I thought it would be right up my alley. I can’t tell you how much it’s not me.’
While her acting career may have slowed down in the 2000s, she ended up receiving an Oscar nomination for her role in the 2012 film The Sessions.
After making her directorial debut with Then She Found Me in 2007, she directed Ride in 2014.
She has also directed episodes of numerous TV shows, including Californication, House Of Lies, This Is Us, Feud: Bette And Joan, and The Politician.
In 2012, she revealed how directing was ‘probably closer to my personality’.
She told The Mirror: ‘I love directing. You’re sitting here like this solving problems.
‘You’re not naked in front of a bunch of strangers pouring your heart out.’
One of her earliest hits was Twister, the 1996 film about two storm chasers.
Decades later, she and her co-star Daveed Diggs wanted to create a sequel to the film featuring an ethic minority cast, but the idea got shut down.
She told The Guardian at the time that it was a ‘sobering’ reminder that the industry still isn’t nearly inclusive enough.
After winning an Oscar in 1997 with her role as Carol Connelly in As Good As It Gets, she began to consider how famous she really wanted to be (pictured in the early 2000s)
When she’s not busy acting or directing, Helen enjoys the simple joys of life, which include travelling, yoga, and surfing
One of her most recent trips that she shared with her followers was a holiday to Barcelona
More recently, Helen has been acting and directing, featuring in the HBO series Hacks between 2024 and 2025 and the series Blindspotting between 2021 and 2023.
In 2025, she landed a lead role in the 2025 thriller In Cold Light, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in June.
As for her love life, she ended up splitting from Matthew in 2017.
At the time, a source claimed that the couple had been on rocky ground for years.
‘Matthew moved out a few times over the years,’ they said. ‘Helen would always take him back, and then time would pass, and she’d kick him out again.’
Several years later, Helen found love again with actor Jeffrey Nordling.
The couple dated in the late 1980s after meeting on a film set and rekindled their romance around 2022.
In January, they celebrated their fourth anniversary with a sweet post on Instagram.
Sharing a love-up selfie, Helen simply captioned the post: ‘…and now we’re 4.’
And when she’s not busy acting or directing, Helen enjoys the simple joys of life, which include travelling, yoga, and surfing.
She also likes watching movies in her local cinema.
‘I go to the movies; I’m a huge movie fan,’ she once told Vulture. ‘I get my screeners, but I like going to the movies and buying my popcorn and watching the movies.’
