Swanson began her acting career at
The Actors Workshop with
R. J. Adams and promptly moved into TV advertising roles and several one-off appearances in TV series such as
Cagney & Lacey and
Alfred Hitchcock Presents. In 1986, she debuted on the big screen in two
John Hughes films:
Pretty in Pink, in a non-speaking role, and ''
Ferris Bueller's Day Off'' as a character who announces a convoluted excuse for Ferris's absence in class. Her first starring role was later in 1986, in
Wes Craven's
Deadly Friend as Samantha"the girl next door." The next year she played Cathy in
Flowers in the Attic, an adaptation of
V. C. Andrews'
bestselling novel. Swanson described how she was cast in
Pretty in Pink: "[Writer] John Hughes said, 'We're re-shooting the end of
Pretty in Pink. I was wondering if you would come be in this scene with our main character, Ducky, because the way we tested it in the movie theater, it didn't work. We need him to end up with somebody else at the end of the movie. So would you play the part?'" By 1990, Swanson had made many television appearances, including multiple appearances in
Knots Landing (1987–1988),
Nightingales (1989), her first starring role in a television series, although it only lasted a season, and a short-lived
Burt Reynolds television series called
B.L. Stryker (1989). Throughout the 1990s, she starred mostly in films. She played the title role in the 1992 film
Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Although not a hit at the box office originally, it had a profitable rental life. She appeared in both starring and supporting roles in films such as
Hot Shots!,
The Program,
The Chase, and her most critically acclaimed role, playing Kristen Connor, a student discovering her sexuality, in
John Singleton's
Higher Learning. She also appeared in the film adaptation of the comic-book
The Phantom and the dark comedy
8 Heads in a Duffel Bag with
Joe Pesci. Most of these films failed at the box office, and she reverted to television work in the late 1990s. In the 1998–99 season of
Early Edition, Swanson played Erica Paget, a love interest of the main character, Gary Hobson. In 1999, Swanson played Vanessa, the ex-girlfriend of
Adam Sandler in the film
Big Daddy. In 2000, she returned to a television series, as the star of
Grapevine, a revamp of a 1992 TV series that was canceled after five episodes. The same year, she starred in the successful film ''
Dude, Where's My Car?'', alongside
Ashton Kutcher,
Seann William Scott and
Jennifer Garner. Swanson posed nude for
Playboy magazine in November 2002 in a cover-featured pictorial. She appeared in and won in the 2006 Fox television program
Skating with Celebrities, partnered with
Lloyd Eisler. In 2007, she became a
spokesperson of the
Medifast diet. In the following year, she guest-starred in three episodes of the lesbian web series
3Way. In the same year, she appeared in an episode
Law & Order: Criminal Intent. In 2021, a release date of June 15 was announced for Swanson's recent feature and a Jennifer Nichole Lee and Paul Schneider collaboration,
Just Another Dream. She co-starred alongside long-time friend Dean Cain. ==Personal life==