Barbeau first gained notice on the Broadway stage in an early 1970s revival of "Fiddler on the Roof" and garnered a Tony nomination and Theater World Award for her performance as Rizzo in "Grease" (1971). The success of "Maude" led to such TV-movie credits as co-starring with Desi Arnaz, Jr. in the medical drama "Having Babies" (her TV-movie debut, 1976), and "Someone's Watching Me" (1978), a nifty thriller (the first of several collaborations) helmed by John Carpenter (whom she married in 1979 and later divorced), Barbeau gradually evolved from playing ingenues to mothers and worldly older woman in later TV movies including the western "Blood River" (1991) starring Rick Schroeder and written by Carpenter, and the remake of "Jailbreakers" (1994), part of Showtime's "Rebel Highway" series.

Barbeau has done her most enjoyable feature work in collaboration with Carpenter ("The Fog" 1980; "Escape From New York" 1981) and horror auteur George Romero ("Creepshow" 1982; "Two Evil Eyes" 1990). Whereas Carpenter envisioned her as a hard-boiled leading lady who comfortably packs a rod, Romero got much mileage from her campy turns playing hard-eyed harpies.