Marilyn Burns was born Mary Lynn Ann Burns on May 7, 1949 in Erie, Pennsylvania, and raised in Houston, Texas. She attended the University of Texas at Austin where she graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Drama.

Marilyn was one of the original scream queens, remembered primarily for her role in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974). She played Sally Hardesty, a teenager who travels with her brother and some friends to the cemetery where her grandfather was buried to investigate reports of grave vandalism, and then encounters an insane, murderous family, including the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface. Her follow-up appearance was in Eaten Alive (1976), where she played a vacationer who unwittingly stumbles upon a hotel managed by a maniac who feeds his guests to his crocodile.