Alvarado said in a People magazine interview for the movie Stella: "I lead kind of a quiet life.
There followed roles in a string of TV shows and movies before she appeared in Gillian Armstrong's 1984 drama Mrs. Soffel.
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.
[4] After Stella, Alvarado played the role of Elinor Hartley in American Friends, which Michael Palin both wrote and starred.
Alvarado later worked alongside John Goodman on the 1992 biopic The Babe, playing the role of Helen Woodford Ruth.
"[9] She and her cast mates endured lessons in Victorian life, including proper etiquette, and restricting dresses.
"[9] Alvarado's next film was 1995's The Perez Family, co-starring Alfred Molina, Anjelica Huston and Marisa Tomei.
The next year saw the release of The Frighteners, Peter Jackson's horror/comedy film about a con artist who sees ghosts, and The Christmas Tree, the directorial debut of actress Sally Field.
In the making-of documentary included with the revamped DVD, Alvarado admitted to enduring bruises because of the active, violent scenes in the movie and to being "cursed"; an ice cream truck from a local New Zealand vendor would go by playing "Greensleeves" every time Jackson did a close-up on her and make her break character.