She first attracted attention in the cast of the TV sitcom "Operation Petticoat" (1977-78), based on the 1959 movie that starred her father, Tony Curtis, but she came to prominence in a string of low- and medium-budget horror films, beginning with John Carpenter's Halloween (1978) and followed by Prom Night, Terror Train, The Fog (all 1980), and Halloween II (1981). Roles in the modest Love Letters (1983) and Grandview, U.S.A (1984) boosted her stock, although the box-office fizzle of Perfect (1985). A Man in Love (1987) gave Curtis a plum part as the wife of Peter Coyote thrown over for glamorous Greta Scacchi, but it was her starring role in A Fish Called Wanda (1988) that cemented her reputation as a gifted comic actress. She worked hard, to little avail, in the silly cop thriller Blue Steel (1990), and was positively ubiquitous in 1991, appearing in Queens Logic, Dreamland, My Girl and Criminals on the big screen, and costarring in the comedy series "Anything But Love" (1989-92). She also wrote a children's book. 1994 films include My Girl 2, Mother's Boys (as a psycho!), and True Lies.