[3] At age 18, after graduating from Van Nuys High School in 1956, Baker moved to New York to study acting with Charles Conrad and ballet with Nina Fonaroff.

Finally out of her contract with Fox after starring in the fourth screen version of Grace Miller White's novel Tess of the Storm Country and The 300 Spartans (1962), Baker appeared in Stolen Hours, a 1963 remake of Dark Victory (Mirisch Corp. and United Artists), and, the same year, opposite Paul Newman and Elke Sommer in The Prize (MGM).

In 1964, she co-starred with Joan Crawford in both Strait-Jacket, William Castle's thriller about an axe murderess, and an unsold television pilot Royal Bay, released to theaters as Della.

She co-starred with Gregory Peck and Walter Matthau in the thriller Mirage (1965), directed by Edward Dmytryk, and in Krakatoa, East of Java (1969) with Maximilian Schell.

In August 1967, Baker played David Janssen's love interest in the two-part finale of The Fugitive, which became the most-watched show in the history of episodic television up until that time.