After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts Janet McTeer began her successful theatrical career with the Royal Exchange Theatre. Her television work includes the BBC production of Nigel Nicolson's book Portrait of a Marriage in which she played Vita Sackville-West and the popular ITV series The Governor written by Lynda La Plante. She made her screen debut in Half Moon Street, a 1986 film based on a novel by Paul Theroux, and appeared in the 1992 film version of Wuthering Heights, with Juliette Binoche and Ralph Fiennes, and Carrington (1995) with Emma Thompson and Jonathan Pryce.

In 1996, McTeer garnered critical acclaim - and both the Laurence Olivier Theatre Award and Critics' Circle Theatre Award for her performance as Nora in a West End production of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House. The following year, the production transferred to Broadway, and she was honored with a Tony Award, Theatre World Award, and Drama Desk Award as Best Actress in a Play.

During the show's run, McTeer was interviewed by Charlie Rose on his PBS talk show, where she was seen by filmmaker Gavin O'Connor, who was working on a screenplay about a single mother's cross-country wanderings with her pre-teen daughter. Enamoured with the actress, he was determined she should star in the film, and when prospective backers balked at her relative anonymity in the States, he produced the movie himself. Tumbleweeds proved to be a 1999 Sundance Film Festival favourite, and McTeer's performance won her a Golden Globe as Best Actress and Academy Award and Screen Actors Guild nominations in the same category.

McTeer's screen credits include Songcatcher with Aidan Quinn, Waking the Dead with Billy Crudup and Jennifer Connelly, the dogme film The King is Alive with Jennifer Jason Leigh, The Intended with Brenda Fricker and Olympia Dukakis and Tideland written and directed by Terry Gilliam.

She appeared in the British TV series The Amazing Mrs Pritchard and Five Days, and as Mary, Queen of Scots in Mary Stuart in London's West End.