Gisela Valcárcel

Alvarez was born on 26 January 1963, to her parents Jorge Valcárcel and Teresa Álvarez. She studied at Institución Educativa Teresa González de Fanning.

Alvarez was a minor when she was became pregnant with boyfriend Jorge Pozo.  Once her daughter Ethel was born, Alvarez began her arduous and convoluted path to success. She started as a secretary at a car company and was hired as an extra for theater performances.

Her career in show business began when she publicly kissed Venezuelan singer Oscar de León live on Peruvian television. She was working as a part-time receptionist on Panamerican televisión, channel 5, back then.

She started as a comic actress and a dancer ("vedette"), in the program Risas y Salsa and La gran Revista.

In 1987, Panamericana Televisión proposed conducting a Peruvian version of Hello Susana, which would be named "Alo Gisela". Alvarez then became the queen of daytime television on Peruvian TV for several years during the late '80s and early '90s.

Her guests have been famous Latin American stars such as Julio Iglesias, Luis Miguel, Guillermo Dávila, Ricardo Montaner, Shakira, María Antonieta de las Nieves, Isabel Pantoja, José Luis Rodríguez, Menudo, Ricky Martin, Thalía, Paulina Rubio, Rocío Dúrcal, and Paloma San Basilio. Her TV shows were always very popular due to her interaction with the audiences, including phone conversations on TV and offering advice to the audience, especially housewives. At the same time, she founded "Amarige Salon & Urban Spa", a beauty parlor.

Gisela Valcárcel simultaneously hosted Saturday nighttime television shows in the late nineties and early 2000, including a local version of Big Brother named La Casa de Gisela.

Her latest project is a local version of Bailando por un sueño in franchise with Mexican TV station Televisa. In January 2009 she traveled to the United States to get a new franchise in the Natpe conference. In February 2009 she returned to Lima with her new TV project: El Show de los Sueños, again in a franchise with Televisa.

In 2010 she hosted "El Gran Show".

In 2012, she hosted Operación Triunfo, the Peruvian version of Star Academy. However, in August she decided to return to the dance reality show El Gran Show.

She was involved in a political scandal when a video of her with José Francisco Carreño Crousillat and Vladimiro Montesinos was released. The footage shows that Montesinos informed Alvareaz of measures to be taken to prevent the distribution of a book (La Señito by Carlos Vidal) that reveals intimate aspects of her life. This was denounced as an offense against public administration. A lawsuit was not filed since the judge dismissed the complaint and acquitted the parties involved of all charges.

On 10 June 1995, she married Roberto Martínez Vera-Tudela, a popular soccer player & captain of "la U". The wedding grabbed local headlines in the national press and was broadcast live on television. After some years, the couple divorced.

During the political scandal, Alvarez also began a personal spiritual search that took her to India, where she met some religious leaders, including Sathya Sai Baba, and in the U.S. Deepak Chopra.

In 2006, after six years of romance, she married Peruvian architect Javier Carmona. The couple separated shortly after the marriage due to a supposed affair between Carmona and another Peruvian entertainer Tula Rodríguez. Alvarez had mentored Rodriguez and considered the affair a betrayal.

Alvarez currently owns and manages the "Amarige" Beauty Salons & Spas in Lima. She is the director of women's magazines Gisela and Amarige. She also runs her own television production company called GV Productions.

In 2005 her autobiography, My Name is Gisela, was published by Santillana Group. In it, she gives an account of her life from childhood, including her beginnings as a star and her coming to television as hostess of the program Aló Gisela.

If I talk about my sorrows and joys that is because what friends do: tell everything

— Gisela Valcarcel, at presentation of the book (translated from Spanish)

• Tarata (2008)