The alphabet has picked up new seasons of comedies Modern Family, Suburgatory and The Middle.

For dramas, Grey’s Anatomy, Revenge, Castle and Once Upon a Time also earned full-season orders.

That leaves GCB, Missing and Body of Proof on the bubble, along with The River, and several others.

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Raimi, who is producing the new version, wasn’t there for her initial audition, but Campbell, director Fede Alvarez, two casting directors, and a producer were. And in Levy’s mind, it was not a great audition. “I went in there deciding to go as crazy as I possibly could—why not let it all go?” she remembers. “Let’s have an experiment to really let go in an audition. So I was like this lunatic, stomping around and crying and screaming. And immediately after I finished, I got so embarrassed and I practically ran out of the room. And then I was embarrassed that I got embarrassed. I asked my agent to call the casting directors and apologize for my behavior. But it turned out I got the part. I guess they were looking for a crazy person.”

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“Through the whole process, she was always so level and unshaken. I later heard from her manager that when she got the part, she was screaming and jumping up and down. I never would have known,” Kapnek says, adding that Levy’s inexperience might have helped her land the part. “I think a lot of the time when people have been in the industry forever and have been at it a long time, they belong to a very specific cadence of comedy. And Jane was so other than that; she had such a natural delivery and such a realistic and organic state of mind.”

Levy has always done things her own way, be it living in England for six months at 15 or dropping out of college after a year and moving to New York City to start her acting career. Growing up in Marin County in Northern California, Levy knew she wanted to be an actor from an early age and participated in community theater and shows during her freshman year of high school before quitting. “I didn’t really get along with my drama teacher, which was part of it,” she admits. “I would always get a B-plus, no matter what. I gave it everything I got, and he gave me a B-plus; it made me crazy.” She also confesses she found something clichéd about wanting to be an actor. “I figured this was ridiculous — every girl dreams about being an actress.”

Later, while attending Goucher College in Baltimore and finding she lacked a passion for her studies, she had another realization: “Then I thought, this is even more ridiculous, to spend all this money on tuition when I didn’t know what I was doing, and if there was something I really wanted, I should go after it.” Her first step was to move to New York City, where she stayed at a house in Brooklyn with her brother, who was attending New York University.

Though she was still a teenager, Levy says she’s never hesitated at jumping into a new situation. She cites England as an example; though her high school didn’t have an exchange program, she found one on her own in order to study abroad. The experience didn’t turn out quite as she planned. “I thought all of England would be like London, and I thought I would be wearing a cute uniform and smoking cigarettes in the bathroom and having picnics after school,” she says. “I ended up in the West Midlands near Birmingham, and it’s not the nicest area, and the family was not very nice to me. They treated me like an American slave and made me babysit and cook for them and clean the house. But I learned a lot about seeing things through, even when it’s not fun or easy.”

New York Stories

Levy had never formally studied acting before signing up for a two-year program at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, where she flourished. “At college, I wasn’t passionate about anything I was studying. When I got to acting school, I felt I had finally found it,” she enthuses. “To be honest, there are so many things I learned in acting school beyond the method; it was a safe place to practice. So acting school was about exercising that acting muscle and doing it every single day — and having people tell you that you’re bad every single day! Which pushes you to work even harder.” Levy went straight through the summer without taking a break, allowing her to finish the program in a year and a half.

Levy decided not to pursue auditions while studying, choosing instead to concentrate on school. “I don’t know how you can ever really be ready, but I just wasn’t ready mentally and emotionally,” she says. “I was too nervous.” Just prior to graduation, she sent out a packet with her headshot and résumé to talent agents, managers, and casting directors around New York City. One manager, James Suskin, called her in for a meeting — once he found her. “I guess I didn’t include my email in my package,” Levy says with a laugh. “So he found me on Facebook. I was like, ‘Who is this creepy guy on Facebook? I should definitely not go over there.’ But then I looked him up and realized he was legitimate.” Suskin began sending her out on auditions, and Levy booked one of her first; he signed her and they’ve been together ever since.

Which is not to say auditioning came easy to Levy, who says bluntly, “One of my first was an HBO pilot, and I almost shit my pants going in there.” For one of her first screen tests, she broke out in hives the night before. And even landing the parts proved intimidating. “Shameless” marked her first time in front of the camera. “My first scene I ever did was me pouncing on Cameron Monaghan and taking his pants off, essentially pretending to go down on him,” she says. “My first scene ever, ever, ever.”

Levy says she still struggles with auditions but has calmed down considerably in the two years since she started. Last year the script for “Suburgatory” came her way, and though it was her first pilot season, she knew it was something special. “I try not to get attached to stuff; I try to move on,” she says. “But this was the first one I went out for and it was exciting.” She says the process was fast — she estimates auditioning six times within 10 days. “I was told by everyone to keep my expectations low, so I did. But when I found out it was actually going to happen, I went crazy.”

As for having to relive her teen years onscreen, Levy says she doesn’t mind. “It’s fun with Tessa because she’s a very advanced 15-year-old,” she says. “I wasn’t as comfortable with myself or mature when I was her age. And I like her as a person. I like what she does for her friends, how she is with her father.”

Not unlike her character, Levy sounds well-adjusted when it comes to dealing with her new situation, which includes having her face all over town on billboards and posters. “I have amazing parents and some really great friends that would kick my butt if I ever started acting different,” she says. “And my life really hasn’t changed that much, except I can buy myself stuff.” Her big extravagance? “When we got picked up, I bought a really nice bed.”

First Position

Now that the world is aware of Levy, there will be more opportunities to see her on bigger screens. She had two films at this year’s Sundance Film Festival; one, “Nobody Walks,” she says she “was all but cut out of,” but the other, “Fun Size,” opens Oct. 26 in theaters. “I play the sidekick of the main character, a girl who desperately wants to be popular,” Levy says, adding, “It was a lot of fun to work on.” Her one disappointment was not getting to meet co-star Johnny Knoxville during the shoot.

As for future roles, Levy is shooting the much-discussed remake of “Evil Dead” on her hiatus for release in 2012. And when it comes to choosing future projects, she claims she’s up for anything. “I’m not looking for anything specific,” she says. “I just would like to try new things and always be doing something different.”

In the meantime, she can be seen on “Suburgatory,” which has already been picked up for its second season. Kapnek teases that the May 16 Mother’s Day-themed finale will feature some of Levy’s best work yet. “It will really knock your socks off in terms of her range and acting chops,” Kapnek says. “It’s pretty dramatic for a half-hour comedy, and she destroyed it. She really made me cry.” And Kapnek, for one, has no doubt that Levy is in the acting game for the long haul. Kapnek jokes that she’s often said to her agent, “I know we’ll look back at this and say, ‘Remember when Jane Levy was the star of “Suburgatory”?’ She’s just destined for huge things.”

Outtakes

- The first role Levy booked was in an indie film called “Eye of the Hurricane,” but she had to drop out because she was cast on “Shameless.”

- Levy met her TV dad, Jeremy Sisto, for the first time at the “Suburgatory” table read: “We hit it off instantly. We just get along with each other and have a really fun time.”

- For Season 2 of “Shameless,” the character Levy originated was played by Emma Greenwell.

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If you grow up in Marin, it isn’t too much of a stretch to play a suburban teenager on a TV sitcom.

But a psychopath?

“For a while, whenever I was asked what my dream role would be, my answer was always to play a killer or a psychopath,” says Jane Levy, who grew up in San Anselmo and stars in ABC’s new comedy series “Suburgatory.”

Lucky for her, the 22-year-old is now in New Zealand filming a remake of Sam Raimi’s “The Evil Dead.” Her dream has, apparently, come true.

“I get to do that in this movie, although I’ll be possessed while I destroy my victims. So basically, it’s a perfect job,” she says with a laugh.

Not that her regular job is all that bad. Levy has been earning kudos for her role as Tessa, a sassy New York City teen who gets shuttled off to the suburbs by her single dad (Jeremy Sisto) and, as horrifying as that may be at first, actually finds herself starting to fit in.

“Levy is one to watch,” notes Forbes, naming her on its list of 30 under 30 who are “making a difference.”

“What works in ‘Suburgatory’ is that Levy is pitch-perfect,” says the Hollywood Reporter.

“Delightfully dry-witted,” says the Chicago Sun-Times.

“Tart and sympathetic,” notes the Boston Globe.

Levy got the acting bug as a little girl and performed in plays as a student at Brookside School and Drake High School, where she was a soccer star and team captain in her senior year. She made varsity at Goucher College in Baltimore, but she dropped out before her sophomore year to see if she could make it in acting.

Pretty much everyone would agree she did. Within a year of moving to Los Angeles — after studying at New York’s Stella Adler Conservatory — Levy nabbed a role in Showtime’s “Shameless,” starring William H. Macy, and in two movies, “Fun Size,” a teen comedy with Chelsea Handler coming out this Halloween, and a small role in “Nobody Walks,” an indie film with Dylan McDermott.

As much as it’s easy to see similarities between San Anselmo and Chatswin, Tessa’s despised fictional suburb — “It’s like the Million Mom March. They’re shuffling out of the tanning salons in their mani-pedi flip-flops, with their ever-present daughters and enormous frozen coffee drinks,” Tessa observes — Levy says she loves Marin.

“I consider myself a very lucky girl that I grew up there. I think it’s the most beautiful place in the world,” she says. “Also I’ve never had better food anywhere else in the world.”

Levy’s parents — Lester, a co-founder of Judicial Arbitration Mediation Services and a musician, and Mary, an artist — moved to San Francisco last summer. Brother Simon lives there, too.

“It’s really lovely to come home to the city. I miss my old house only a little bit,” she says.

The IJ caught up with Levy while she was still filming in New Zealand.

Q: It’s pretty amazing to go from a small role on a TV series to co-starring in your own series. Are you still pinching yourself or do you think, hey, I’m good so I deserve this?

A: There is a lot of pinching myself. And slapping myself.

Q: Are you like Tessa or any of the other roles you’ve had so far?

A: I am like all of the characters I play. I believe it’s impossible not to be. I am who I am, and no matter how hard I try I can’t change that. Each character I create is just highlighted parts of my personality. With Tessa, I think a lot about her thoughtfulness and her intelligence. Also her goofiness; I’m pretty goofy.

Q: In what way is Chatswin like Marin and in what way does it differ?

A: Chatswin is made of plastic and Marin is made of beautiful nature and organic food. But they do have similarities. Both are luxurious; people spend way to much time obsessing over their children. Everyone spends heaps of money to look younger.

Q: You told ESPN that you developed a sense of self before moving to Hollywood; where did that come from?

A: Probably a lot of places. For one, my parents gave me the space to discover things ever since I was really young. They gave me a lot of love, but they didn’t hover. I’ve always been a pretty independent, curious person. That led me to taking lots of risks, such as living on my own in England at 15 for four months or moving across the country for school at 17. I didn’t move to Hollywood until I was 20. I had already lived a lot of life by then.

Q: Were your parents horrified that you dropped out of college, were they supportive or did they give you a time frame to get famous or else?

A: I came home from a summer backpacking trip in Europe with two weeks before I was supposed to start my sophomore year of college. I sat them down at the kitchen table and told them I wasn’t going back. Of course, they were horrified! But they swallowed their fears and listened to me. I told them acting was what made me happy and I wanted to go to theater school instead of undergrad. They said OK. They’ve always trusted me, and I think that’s what has given me the confidence to always go after what I want.

Q: So you’re going from comedy and the “hell” known as suburbia to something much more sinister in “Evil Dead.” What about the role intrigues you?

A: I really wanted to work on “Evil Dead” because of how different it is from “Suburgatory.” I guess that’s my main goal in this industry, to work on different stuff and to play a wide range of characters. That process of creating a new person is so fun for me. I love the initial makeup/hair tests before the start of a new job; I’m always campaigning for a new hair color or length, anything to look as different as possible.

This role also intrigued me because of how much I will learn, mostly technical stuff like special effects. That’s fascinating to me. I had to get my body “casted” for this role so they can make me prosthetics. That process entailed getting your whole body covered in green goo, like the stuff they put in your mouth for a tooth casting, and then being papier-mâchéd. It was the coolest thing ever.

Q: Now that you’re in Hollywood, is it better, worse or the same as your expectations?

A: I honestly didn’t have that many expectations. The city itself I didn’t love when I first arrived. But recently I’ve come to really enjoy Los Angeles and I miss it a lot while filming on the other side of the world.

The Sitcom Princess

Jane Levy, 22, who often draws comparisons to Emma Stone, stars in ABC’s smart new hit Suburgatory.

Her Favorite Bag
“My mom was one of the original designers for Coach in the eighties, and she designed some classics, including the City Bag. It’s the only bag I use!”

What She’s Doing This Weekend
“Something that has to do with really good food, like a great dinner party. I love to eat.”

Her Next Vacation
“I’m reading a book right now that takes place in Georgia, and I really want to be a Southern girl. Mostly I want to try moonshine!”

Jane Levy
One of the most pleasant surprises of this past TV season has been “Suburgatory,” a smart, often hilarious sitcom from “Parks and Recreation” writer Emily Kapnek that plays out like a small-screen take on “Mean Girls.” And it’s no surprise that 23-year-old Jane Levy, who plays the lead character Tessa on the show, already looks to be making some major inroads into the movie world. Levy, a Stella Adler grad from Marin County, first appeared in a recurring role on Showtime’s “Shameless” before bagging the lead in the ABC show, and she’s displayed a sharp wit and impressive range across the season. And big-screen casting directors have clearly been paying attention, as she’s got three movies due for release across the next year or so. First up is Ry Russo-Young’s acclaimed Sundance pic “Nobody Walks” (co-written by Lena Dunham), in which she stars alongside Olivia Thirlby and John Krasinski, and October will see her play the lead in “Fun Size,” the feature debut of “O.C.” mastermind Josh Schwartz, in which she’ll play a wayward, troubled teen who loses her brother on Halloween night; if Schwartz’s previous work is anything to go by, this could turn out to be an “Easy A”-style sleeper hit. But an even bigger chance at stardom comes next April, as Levy bagged the lead role in the “Evil Dead” remake after Lily Collins dropped out. The part, a recovering addict taken to a cabin for an intervention (only for the undead to interene), seems to be very different from the usual scream-queen kind of roles, and it’s clear from “Suburgatory” that Levy’s got the chops to pull that off, and much more besides.

In a little over a year, Jane Levy has gone from anonymously mailing her picture and résumé to agents, to carrying her own sitcom — ABC’s Suburgatory — and starring in a gigantic remake of Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead. One key to Levy’s rise: her incredibly gorgeous headshot.

“My manager wanted to work with me before he’d ever heard me open my mouth. He said I had a marketable face,” says Levy, with a shrug. Indeed, Levy has the doe-eyed, cute-but-glamorous, gorgeous-but-approachable, young-but-wise look that Hollywood eats up. But it was her ability to expertly pull off both withering deadpan asides and serious romantic drama that got her working so fast.

She wrapped up a role on Showtime’s Shameless, has a small part in Ry Russo-Young’s Nobody Walks and is the lead in Josh Schwartz’s Fun Size. With that comes lots of attention, which Levy claims her four-year-old self would have lapped up, but her 22-year-old self finds painful. “When ten people and a photographer are talking about you, and you don’t know what they want from you… I don’t know, it gives me all kinds of bad feelings. Who cares about my face?” Levy fights back in her own way, attempting to upend the obsessive vanity that distracts from actual performance. “I try to change my hair for each part,” she says. A few weeks before The Evil Dead starts filming, Levy is campaigning for a mousy brown, which Suburgatory heads were against. “They want me to keep it the same. But I’ll win.”

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ESPNHS: Was there a point in your life, before you started acting, that you thought you could reach the highest level of soccer?

Jane Levy: I wasn’t naturally talented, but I worked so hard and committed myself 100 percent. I enjoyed the process of training, learning and hanging out with my teammates.

ESPNHS: Did you attend soccer camp?

JL: Yes, a two-week camp. I miss the smell of freshly cut grass and being up too early. It was such a fun time.

ESPNHS: Do you play anymore?

JL: I completely stopped when I left college at 18. I had a good run and learned a lot. It might sound cliché, but being a team player [helps you understand that you’re] just one piece of a huge puzzle. Its not all about you. That has helped me in everything I do.

ESPNHS: When did you first know you wanted to act?

JL: When I was little, I asked my mom to move us to Los Angeles and get me an agent. She would say, “Stop it. Go play in the dirt.” So I shoved it aside because she did. We both thought, “Well, every young girl wants to be an actress.” When I found myself still having those feelings at 17, I thought, “Maybe this is what I really want to do?” So I went for it.

ESPNHS: So you had a real high school experience?

JL: Totally. I developed a sense of self before moving to crazy Hollywood, which was really important.

ESPNHS: Did you act in high school?

JL: Yes, but I stopped after my freshman year. I started focusing on soccer instead.

ESPNHS: Most memorable moment on the field?

JL: I was really proud of my yellow cards and getting ’em in when I had to. I never hurt anybody. For me, it was more important to save a goal than to make one — maybe because I wasn’t good at scoring. But when I saved a goal, it felt so good. I had saved my team from taking a bullet!

ESPNHS: As captain, how did you motivate your team?

JL: Every week, we’d have dinner together. We didn’t just talk about sports. We’d cover everything, from boys to schoolwork to what we were doing outside of school. That really brought us together.

ESPNHS: Most embarrassing moment on the field?

JL: I scored an own goal, which is the most painful experience ever. I honestly don’t remember the details. I just know it happened. I probably blocked it out because it was traumatizing.

ESPNHS: Will Tessa, your character “Suburgatory,” ever play sports?

JL: No, she’s not interested in sports. She thinks jocks are dumb. But she’ll soon realize they’re not. It’s just bad judgment.

Jane Levy’s not the only athlete-turned-celebrity. Read about how high school sports helped shape Avril Lavigne and Nina Dobrev into the stars they are today.

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