The daughter of a native Japanese mother and a Finnish-American serviceman father, Hill experienced a lonely childhood growing up in rural South Dakota. Traveling to Japan as a teen, Hill attended the Sophia International University in Tokyo and worked part-time in radio and TV. Back in the states, she attended the American Conservatory Theater and became a busy voice-over performer and improviser in the California Bay Area. Hill became a West Coast stage fixture and performed her autobiographical one-woman show "Tokyo Bound" there before bringing it to the "Festival of New Voices" at New York's Public Theater.
Most of Hill's film and TV work has been in small character bits, often playing medical professionals and technicians. She appeared in several projects helmed by Wayne Wang ("Dim Sum: a little bit of heart" 1984; and the short "Dim Sum Take-Outs" 1988) and provided narration for two documentaries by Steven Okazarki ("Unfinished Business" 1985; "Troubled Paradise" 1992). Hill's TV guest spots include appearances on "Growing Pains", "Perfect Strangers" and "Beverly Hills, 90210".
Hill continues to work on stage and write. She has written scripts for "The Puzzle Place", a daily preschool series stressing multicultural values, that began airing on PBS in 1995. She also briefly returned to series TV in the short-lived Marie Osmond vehicle "Maybe This Time" (ABC, 1995). In 1997, Hill joined the cast of NBC's revamped sitcom "The Naked Truth" for its final season, playing a tabloid photographer, and the actress would continue to be a familiar fixture on the small screen, guesting on several series and enjoying recurring roles on "The Hughleys," "My Wife and Kids" and "That's So Raven." On the big-screen her comedic talents earned her scene-stealing supporting turns in films such as "Next Friday" (2000), "Max Keeble's Big Movie" (2001) and "Big Fat Liar" (2002), while she voiced Mrs. Hagasawa in Disney's animated hit "Lilo & Stitch" and nabbed other voice acting parts on TV's "King of the Hill" and "Jackie Chan Adventures." She had a major screen role as Mrs. Kwan, the nanny and rival to Mike Myers' Cat in Mrs. Kwan in the hyperactive "Dr. Seuss' The Cat in the Hat."