Biography

Hanft was born in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. She started her theatrical career in the early 1960 during the Golden Age of experimental theater at such venues as La Mama ETC and Caffe Cino and in a few years she became known as "the Helen Hayes of off-off Broadway." Not a great beauty, she nevertheless commanded the stage with her strong Ethel Merman

Ethel Merman

Ethel Merman was an American actress and singer. Known primarily for her powerful voice and roles in musical theatre, she has been called "the undisputed First Lady of the musical comedy stage." Among the many standards introduced by Merman in Broadway musicals are "I Got Rhythm", "Everything's...

-style comedic talent and ability to satirize her sexuality; she often played eccentric, flamboyant, raunchy characters in many successful plays like the Tom Eyen

Tom Eyen

Tom Eyen was an American playwright, lyricist, television writer and theatre director.Eyen is best known for works at opposite ends of the theatrical spectrum...

 hits Why Hanna's Skirt Won't Stay Down, Women Behind Bars

Women Behind Bars

Women Behind Bars is a play by Tom Eyen.A camp spoof of the exploitation films produced by Universal, Warner's, and Republic Pictures in the 1950s, this black comedy is set in the Women's House of Detention in Greenwich Village...

, Italian American Reconciliation

Italian American Reconciliation

Italian American Reconciliation is a play by John Patrick Shanley. It was first performed at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut in 1986...

, and The Neon Woman

The Neon Woman

The Neon Woman is a comic play written by Tom Eyen. The play is an outrageous murder mystery set in a seedy Baltimore burlesque house run by a retired stripper . It was written as a vehicle for Pink Flamingos star Divine , who had previously starred in a revival of Eyen's Women Behind Bars...

 co-starring Divine. She also had a great personal success in the David Rabe play In The Boom Boom Room

In the Boom Boom Room

In the Boom Boom Room is a play by David Rabe. It focuses on a go-go dancer whose difficult relationship with her parents has propelled her into a series of unfortunate affairs with both men and women....

 at Joseph Papp

Joseph Papp

Joseph Papp was an American theatrical producer and director. Papp established The Public Theater in what had been the Astor Library Building in downtown New York . "The Public," as it is known, has many small theatres within it...

's Public Theatre.

In the middle 1970s Hanft began appearing in movies, some with Woody Allen

Woody Allen

Woody Allen is an American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, jazz musician, author, and playwright. Allen's films draw heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Jewish identity, and the history of cinema...

 (Manhattan, 1979; The Purple Rose of Cairo

The Purple Rose of Cairo

The Purple Rose of Cairo is a 1985 American comedy-drama film written and directed by Woody Allen. Inspired by Sherlock, Jr., Hellzapoppin, and Pirandello's Six Characters in Search of an Author, it is the tale of a film character who leaves a fictional film of the same name and enters the real...

, 1985). She was also a favorite of Paul Mazursky

Paul Mazursky

Paul Mazursky is an American film director, screenwriter and actor.-Personal life:He was born Irwin Mazursky in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Jean , a piano player for dance classes, and David Mazursky, a laborer. Mazursky was born to a Jewish family; his grandfather was an immigrant from...

, who cast her in Next Stop Greenwich Village and Willie and Phil. She had a strong cameos in the 1981 hit Arthur

Arthur

Arthur is a common masculine given name. Its etymology is disputed, but its popularity derives from its being the name of the legendary hero King Arthur....

 with Dudley Moore

Dudley Moore

Dudley Stuart John Moore, CBE was an English actor, comedian, composer and musician.Moore first came to prominence as one of the four writer-performers in the ground-breaking comedy revue Beyond the Fringe in the early 1960s, and then became famous as half of the highly popular television...

 the 1988 License To Drive

License to Drive

License to Drive is a 1988 teen adventure film starring Corey Haim, Corey Feldman, Heather Graham, Carol Kane, Richard Masur, Michael Manasseri and Nina Siemaszko. The screenplay was written by Neil Tolkin and directed by Greg Beeman....

 and in 1992 she appeared opposite Shirley MacLaine

Shirley MacLaine

Shirley MacLaine is an American film and theater actress, singer, dancer, activist and author, well-known for her beliefs in new age spirituality and reincarnation. She has written a large number of autobiographical works, many dealing with her spiritual beliefs as well as her Hollywood career...

 and Marcello Mastroianni

Marcello Mastroianni

Marcello Vincenzo Domenico Mastroianni, Knight Grand Cross was an Italian film actor. His honours included British Film Academy Awards, Best Actor awards at the Cannes Film Festival and two Golden Globe Awards.- Personal life :...

 in Used People

Used People

Used People is a 1992 American romantic comedy film directed by Beeban Kidron. The screenplay by Todd Graff, adapted from his 1988 off-Broadway play The Grandma Plays , takes a humorous look at a highly dysfunctional family living in the New York City borough of Queens circa 1969...

. In the late 1990s she began playing memorable guest roles on such popular TV shows as Law & Order

Law & Order

Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...

. She still makes the occasional stage appearance in New York City and can be seen as Milla Jovovich's painkiller-addicted mother in Dummy

Dummy

Dummy may refer to:*Military dummy:**dummy round—a cartridge that is inert, i.e. contains neither primer nor gunpowder**decoy—fake military equipment intended to deceive the enemy...

, 2002.

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