[2] After college, she worked in a number of regional theater groups and appeared in off-Broadway productions of The Danube, Blood Moon and Clarissa.
[5] Collins has guest starred on the daytime soap operas One Life to Live, Guiding Light, Search for Tomorrow and Another World.
She also played the role of Natalie's mentally ill sister, Janet Green, from 1991 to 1992 and 2005 to 2007, and again in 2010 and 2011.
[6][7] Collins also guest-starred on L.A. Law and co-hosted Good Morning America in 1989, where she substituted for regular host Joan Lunden.
[8] She married Charles Newell, who is the artistic director of the Court Theatre in Chicago, in October 1992.