In 1981, Holly Hunter was hired for Brian De Palma’s thriller ‘Blow Out.’ But not to do what she would later become famous for—that is, to play a feisty, driven woman with a complicated inner life. She was not asked to take a procedure-fixated cop like her Edwina of ‘Raising Arizona’ and make it seem absolutely plausible that she’d settle down in a battered trailer with a hangdog ex-con and flower into a mom-wannabe. There was no request for her to show how a smart, hard-shell television news producer like her Jane Craig of ‘Broadcast News’ could also be filled with emotion and longing. Hunter didn’t have to choose between reciting her dialogue in the twang of her native Conyers, Georgia, or flushing the crackle and sibilance out of her words. “Extra” was the name of Hunter’s uncredited character in ‘Blow Out.’ Or, as she calls it, taking a spoonful of clear consommé at the Hotel Bel-Air Restaurant: “Mob. Part of a mob. Like, one of 4,ooo.” And later, when it’s clear that all the slow motion and freeze-framing in the world won’t yield you a glimpse of Hunter in ‘Blow Out,’ you realize this reliably committed actress wasn’t being humble about her early-career crowd assignment. “I saw almost nothing,” she says when asked what it was like to be a recent Carnegie Mellon acting-school graduate witnessing skilled technicians like John Travolta and John Lithgow at work in front of the camera. “And I wasn’t interested in anything but the money.”

De Palma’s thriller may have been the last time Hunter didn’t bother to apply herself. In fact, rewind through her performances both large and small, and you’ll see that they’re all about confidence and dedication. “Nothing was ever handed to her,” actress Frances McDormand (Fargo) says about the way her old friend turned having a direct gaze, an air of confrontation, and a distinctive regional quality into a Hollywood commodity. And never once did Hunter, now 42 and married to cinematographer and director Janusz Kaminski, capitalize on her five feet two inch frame for its cute factor. “She uses her size to her advantage,” McDormand says. “But not in a stereotypical female way. She could definitely do cute—if she wanted to. It’s just her version of it, not anybody else’s.” McDormand has known Hunter since the early ’80s, when the two shared a three-bedroom apartment in the Bronx. Even then, McDormand knew that for her friend, excellence was the only option. “She’s good at everything she attempts. We used to have contests to see who could get the bathroom the cleanest. She always beat me,” McDormand says with a laugh. “And I’m anal.”

Okay, your real debut was in a Friday the 13th knockoff called The Burning. Can you trace any part of the actress you are now back to that first performance?
[In a tinkly Greer Garson voice] Well, hardly, dahling! [Laughs] I wasn’t evolving into anything at that point. I’d been in New York for three weeks, and I’d met a great casting director, Joy Todd. She really took me under her wing and protected me. She just put me in the movie. I don’t even remember meeting the director, although I probably did. It was a glorified extra part, but I was there for six weeks, and I got to see how actors behave in front of the camera.

Is the level of commitment on a Friday the 13th knockoff the same as on a quality project?
Absolutely not. A six-pack of beer was permanently attached to the camera cart after lunch every day. Now that I’ve never seen since. I would say that indicated a certain lack of commitment. But with The Burning, many of [the actors] felt like me. We were all really new, young, fresh, wanting to act. And we were doing this horror movie in North Tonawanda, New York, just outside of Buffalo. I didn’t know what I was doing. I was a stage actress, and I didn’t have that much interest in movies. It was a blast. But it wasn’t until Joel and Ethan [Coen] offered me the part as Edwina in Raising Arizona that I decided to learn how to become a film actress.

Because?
I knew them already. And I felt protected by them; I trusted them. Then I had the great fortune to go from Joel and Ethan to Jim Brooks. All three directors—I’m including Ethan in that mix—know incredibly well what they’re about: how to take care of actors, how to treat them. They were all amazingly adept at that.