[1] Bauer van Straten studied fine arts at Washington University in St. Louis, as well as in Boston and at New York City’s Parsons The New School for Design in her youth, but decided to become an actress and moved to Los Angeles, where she has been living since she began acting in 1994.

Other recurring roles include Geneva Renault in Total Security, Candy Cooper in That's Life, Rebecca Colfax in Dirty Sexy Money, and Belinda Slypich in Hidden Hills.

Bauer van Straten played a porn star appearing as the featured act at a Los Angeles strip club and performed an extended nude dance.

She has also made a number of guest appearances in several television shows, including LA Law, Seinfeld, Everybody Loves Raymond, Dark Angel, Two and a Half Men, Star Trek: Enterprise, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Desperate Housewives, and George Lopez.

[7] From 2008 to its conclusion in 2014, Bauer van Straten played the vampire Pamela Swynford De Beaufort on the HBO fantasy drama series, True Blood.