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"Ever since thirteen my phone has started ringing again. It feels really great to be back on the radar," says Hunter, who plays Brittany Murphy's confidant in Little Black Book, in theatres tomorrow.
"I've made so many movies that didn't have the life I thought they should, that when I made thirteen I didn't allow myself to hope it would connect with audiences," says Hunter in a New York interview. "The response to it was most gratifying."
It was not only audiences that embraced the powerful film about a teenager whose rebellion leads her into a life of drugs, sex and shoplifting.
Hunter played the mother who misses the early signs of her daughter's descent because she's trying to get her own life in order.
For 2003's thirteen, Hunter was nominated as best supporting actress but lost to Renee Zellweger for her performance in Cold Mountain.
This was Hunter's fourth Oscar nomination.
Her first was for best actress in Broadcast News in 1988.
In 1994 she received both a best actress nomination for The Piano and a best supporting actress nomination for The Firm. She won her Oscar for The Piano.
"When I was nominated for Broadcast News, I really didn't know what it meant.
"I'd only been making movies for about five years and the gravity of the nomination didn't sink in," recalls Hunter, who lost that race to Cher in Moonstruck.
When her double nomination came in 1994, Hunter insists she had "a full appreciation of the rarity of being nominated a second time, let alone twice in the same year.
"My role in The Firm was so small that I was astonished by that nomination."
She says she was grateful for the nomination she received for thirteen but says "you move on after the Oscars and discover it doesn't always translate into work.
"I'm grateful this time around because it most definitely did.
"I had signed for Little Black Book before the nomination but I know I got my role in The Big White as a result of the attention."
The Big White is a comedy that also stars Robin Williams, Woody Harrelson and Alison Lohman.
And Hunter is headed for London this fall to make her West End debut in By The Bog Of Cats, a contemporary version of the Greek classic Medea. "I'd love to stay over in England and Europe to make films because those are cultures fascinated by women in their 40s and 50s."
Hunter also has been attached to the films My Boy (to play the Irish mother of Dublin rock star Phil Lynott) and Downloading Nancy (to play a woman who falls in love with the hit man hired to kill her).
When she was filming Little Black Book, Hunter admits she had flashbacks to Broadcast News because both are set in the world of TV.
"It's great irony that I am not the idealist this time around. I didn't research the world of daytime talk shows because I feel my character is a drifter just visiting this world before she sets out to wreak havoc somewhere else."
Despite their age difference, Hunter says she bonded easily with Murphy.
"We had a blast together because it is always genuine with Brittany. There's no game playing. I've worked with a lot of young actresses and find their energy exhilarating."
In her personal life, Hunter divorced Janusz Kaminski her husband of six years in 2001.
"It's all part of going around the block and I've definitely been around the block a couple of times.
"I'm in a great place right now and I don't mind enjoying it on my own."