Trini Alvarado

Trinidad "Trini" Alvarado (born January 10, 1967) is an American actress best known for her performances as Margaret "Meg" March in the 1994 film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's novel Little Women and Lucy Lynskey in the comedy horror film The Frighteners. She also has had notable stage performances and singing roles in musicals.

Personal life

Alvarado was born in New York City, the daughter of Sylvia, a Puerto Rican flamenco dancer, and Domingo Alvarado, a Spanish-born flamenco singer. As a child, she lived on upper Riverside Drive (Manhattan) in Harlem. She attended the Professional Children's School and studied at Fordham University. Alvarado said in a People magazine interview for the movie Stella: "I lead kind of a quiet life. I just grew up that way." Alvarado more or less stays out of the limelight and is a self-described homebody; she revealed during the promotion for The Frighteners, "It's just difficult to go away. I was very nervous about having to go to New Zealand for nearly seven months [to make The Frighteners]. I was very tragically saying goodbye to everybody."

She resides in New York City and is married to actor Robert McNeill.

Career Alvarado made her show business debut at the age of seven when she joined her family's dance troupe, and that led to roles on stage, including the role of Melinda in Elizabeth Swados's Broadway musical Runaways in 1978. Alvarado was featured, along with Karen Evans, on the song "Lullaby From Baby to Baby", denoted by Swados as the "theme song" of the musical. In 1977–78, she appeared in two Unicorn Tales television specials. The next year, she starred in Rich Kids alongside John Lithgow and Jeremy Levy, and she lent her vocals to the ending song "Happy Ida and Broken-Hearted John". The same year, she appeared in the ABC Afterschool Special "A Movie Star's Daughter" as Dena McKain, her first of two appearances in the series (her second was the 1981 special Starstruck).

In 1980, Alvarado appeared in Times Square with Tim Curry and Robin Johnson, in which she and Johnson sang together "Your Daughter Is One."

There followed roles in a string of TV shows and movies before she appeared in Gillian Armstrong's 1984 drama Mrs. Soffel. In 1985, Alvarado played the role of Anne Frank in the off-Broadway musical Yours, Anne. The following year, she starred as the title character in Maggie Magalita, another off-Broadway production.

Her next roles—the young Lisa Titus in the ill-fated 1987 film The Chair, the tough, smart-aleck May "Mooch" Stark in the frank, girl-dominant teen movie Satisfaction—led up to playing the daughter of Stella Claire (portrayed by Bette Midler), in another version of Stella. Midler and Alvarado bonded on set and performed an impromptu duet of the chorus of the Beatles' "If I Fell" during Alvarado's screen test, which led to Alvarado's being cast. She and her cast mates endured lessons in Victorian life, including proper etiquette, and restricting dresses. About the women's limiting garb, Alvarado said, "It's so obvious why women were thought of as the weaker sex. I don't know if it was a subconscious desire of designers to hold women back, but you can't even take a full breath [in these dresses]." |Molly Garber 1987 Spenser: For Hire|Laurie Kincaid Episode: "Sleepless Dream" 1988 Satisfaction|Mooch 1988 Nitti: The Enforcer|Anna TV movie 1988 The Chair|Lisa Titus 1990 American Playhouse|Younger Elinor Episode: "Sensibility and Sense" 1990 Stella|Jenny Claire 1991 American Friends|Miss Elinor Hartley 1991 American Blue Note|Lorraine 1992 | Episode: "Pilot" 1992 |Helen Woodford Ruth 1994 Little Women|Meg March 1995 |Teresa Perez 1996 |Dr. Lucy Lynskey 1996 |Beth TV movie 1998 Paulie|Adult Marie Alweather 2000 |Denise Cope TV movie 2001 Bitter Winter| TV movie 2004 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit|Maggie Shaye Episode: "Ritual" 2004 |Sandra Saramago Episode: "Three Boys and a Gun" 2006 Little Children|Theresa 2008 Welcome to the Western Indian Ocean|Director TV movie 2008-2009 Fringe|Samantha Loeb Episodes: "In Which We Meet Mr. Jones" / "Bound" 2009 |Sylvia 2010 All Good Things|Sarah Davis 2014 Black Box|Beatrice King Episode: "Forget Me" 2018 Tanya Cookies Magic Storybook|Todd Haydns Episodes: "Toopy's Story", "Tiger Binoo", "Magic Mirror", "Power Pyjamas" 2022 The Staircase'' Patty Peterson