CULTURE
SARAH LEVY GETS SURREALESTATE
MAY 25, 2021
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WORDS
by KRISTOPHER FRASER
PHOTOS
courtesy of NBCUniversal
From sitcom sweetheart on Schitt’s Creek to scream queen on SurrealEstate, Sarah Levy is proving her versatility as an actress. The actress, who is a member of the Levy family, as the daughter of Emmy winning actor Eugene Levy and the sister of Emmy winning Schitt’s Creek star Dan Levy, might miss the family vibe of working on a television set, but she’s dived headfirst into her latest project. SurrealEstate follows a group of real estate agents who specialize in selling haunted houses. It’s a tough job, but somebody’s got to do it.
Levy’s character, Susan Ireland, is very much the realist of the series and thinks ghost and haunted houses are all just make believe, but boy is she in for a rude awakening when she takes a job at The Roman Agency. In this interview with AS IF Magazine, Sarah discusses how she landed the role, the joys of playing make believe again, and how she really learned to scream.
Sarah Levy in SurrealEstate
AS IF: Let’s talk about your new show SurrealEstate!
Sarah Levy: It’s, from what I’ve seen, really fun and kind of everything I hoped it would turn into.
How did you get involved with the project?
I just auditioned for it. I put myself on tape for it last May, and then I didn’t hear anything for about two months, and it was also, as we know, a really strange time with COVID-19.
Yes, very weird time to be auditioning and taping.
I know right! Especially in this industry because you never even know when you’re going to start shooting. So many shows were being postponed and pushed back. I wasn’t expecting to have any job for the whole year just based on what was kind of happening around that time. I put myself on tape for SurrealEstate, and then heard that it went from that to just getting the job two months later. There was no real in between! It was kind of a dream in that sense for an actor. You don’t have to keep going back in and people are asking others if they like you.
You were just cast with one audition tape? That’s amazing!
Yes, so I was very lucky to have had that experience and to find out that. Tim Rozon, who I had worked with on Schitt’s Creek, is a part of the cast as well, which just really sealed the deal for me.
There was no connection going in to like the director or anything. It was completely cold off the one audition?
Yes, completely. I didn’t know anybody. I hadn’t worked with anybody that had produced SurrealEstate, but I felt very connected to the character. Sometimes when you’re doing auditions, you think, ‘If I get this job, I don’t know how I’m going to do it because I just don’t feel connected to it in anyway.’ With this material, I just felt very comfortable and very right. I hate to say, but I wasn’t surprised when I got it.
Sarah Levy in SurrealEstate
