No Typecasting for Her

Despite a Latin heritage that keeps her living at home in a “close family” at age 23, actress Trini Alvarado has managed to avoid typecasting with a remarkably wide range of roles. Her latest: the loving but rebellious daughter of Bette Midler in Touchstone’s “Stella,” a melodrama about a hard-working, blue-collar mother who dreams of upper-crust happiness for her illegitimate child.

“I’ve played Jewish characters, Spanish, Italian, Irish-American,” says the slim, pale, dark-haired beauty. “Knock on wood. I guess I’ve been pretty lucky.”

Alvarado’s father, Domingo, moved to New York from Spain 30 years ago to perform with Flamenco singer Carmen Amaya. He married Sylvia, a dancer, and stayed. Their young daughter, idolizing Shirley Temple and Judy Garland, studied ballet and tap in earnest, joining their Flamenco troupe at age 7. Auditions for stage musicals soon followed.

Trini made her TV debut in 1977 as Goldilocks in a segment of NBC’s “Unicorn Tales,” and, at 11, won a leading role in Joseph Papp’s Broadway production of “Runaways.” The same year, she was cast in the feature film, “Rich Kids.” She has amassed an impressive list of stage, film and TV credits since. Last month, she was seen in the American Playhouse production of “Sensibility and Sense” on PBS.

And now, “Stella,” with the irrepressible Midler.

“She was great,” Alvarado says of Midler. “She really put me at ease.”

During shooting, in a confrontation scene, Alvarado was supposed to brush Midler’s hand away. By accident, Alvarado slapped the star’s face, nicking her with a zipper and drawing blood. “I thought they’d fire me,” Alvarado says. “But Bette said, ‘That was great! It was real!’ ” The slap is used in the final cut of the film.