She made her film debut in her native South Africa in 1968, but became best known in Australia for her role of fashion designer Vera Collins Sutton in the 1970s television soap opera Number 96.
Lee was born in 1939 in Springs, Transvaal Province (present-day Gauteng), and grew up on a gold mine until her father, an electrician, died when she was nine.
[citation needed] A planned comedy spinoff from Number 96, called Fair Game and featuring Lee with Lynette Curran and Abigail, did not eventuate.
She also continued her stage work, including the challenging one-woman show Turn on the Heat, loosely based on the last two hours of Marilyn Monroe's life.
In the 2000s Lee continued to make occasional appearances in Australian films and drama series, and she opened an acting school in Sydney with Judi Farr.