Today we’d like to introduce you to Alivia Levie.
Alivia, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I am living this wonderful life in Los Angeles as a creative who wears a few different hats including modeling, acting, influencer relations, working with brands, running social media accounts all while being a student and its been quite the wild ride. I was born in upstate New York where I lived the first few years of my life until my family and I moved to Northern California; specifically Marin County which is just outside San Francisco. Ever since I was a little girl, I always loved anything and everything that I could fill with passion and fully get my hands on. This mostly consisted of musical theater which was where my love for acting sprouted! I always was a fan of the arts in general including design, fashion, interior design and architecture. Musical theatre was my very first love and ever since my first show, Singing in the Rain, I fell in love with the storytelling aspect of theatre as well as the creative ways to put myself in circumstances of characters I might never get to experience in my everyday life.
I then fell in love with the ability to empathize with those character types and relate to what their lives looked like. Throughout high school, I continued pursuing my love for acting and then discovered it might be my absolute future fate when I began to consider on-screen acting as a career. I ended up accepting a spot at University of Hawaii Manoa for my freshman year of college in 2016 with plans to spend some time on the island and then transfer into a UC school in SoCal. The reason for my acceptance at UHM was due to the opportunities I received the year prior on vacation with my family. I was “discovered” by a local makeup artist with industry connections to a few casting directors on the Island and I have so much to thank this woman for because she is the reason I was so lucky to work on Hawaii Five-0 throughout the year that I lived on the island. After her introduction to one main casting director on the island, before I knew it I was landing stand in gigs and featured work as well.
After a year of going to school and pursuing my degree in Communications while also working on set and gaining experience, I decided It was time to move on and transfer to Southern California in hopes for some big next steps in life. Ive always been obsessed with people! Human beings and human connection are my favorite aspects about life and so when I moved to Los Angeles, I jumped in headfirst to a pool full of new people! I began networking and meeting so many new and amazing fresh friends who truly showed me what community is all about and I have nothing more to say to these people than thank you because if it weren’t for them, I would not be where I am today in my career or as a person. I began joining the social media space, learning what the term “brand personality” means in the aspect of marketing via social media and I fell in love with the digital media world of brand marketing/influencer relations while also finding my own commercial and theatrical agents/managers and pursuing my career as an actress. Now I find myself working with my friend’s agency’s (Extra Hours and Round 2 Agency) as well as various other freelance clients along with attending castings and auditions.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
I always find this question interesting because I often find myself awaiting the constant bell curve in life. There are so truly ups and downs to absolutely everything in life, but without the downs I would never be able to gain appreciation for the ups. I think the entertainment industry is definitely more of an unpredictable career path in the sense of the fact that there is no true path. Every single person in this industry has such a unique set of experiences, which I find so special. I have absolutely had my fair share of people along the way who have tried to bring me down and what those people really don’t realize is that they actually just push you further into the life that you’re working towards for yourself. I have memories of when I was in high school and I started to dabble a little bit in modeling for the first time people were mean! Haha! I find myself laughing now and smiling at the thought of these instances where I wasn’t really supported because I got through them and some of those same girls now have come to ask me for advice or help to begin a modeling career of their own. I kindly tell them exactly what I did to get to where I have gotten today and leave it at that. Most times you get more with sugar than you do with salt!
We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
I wrote about this a little bit a few questions back but I truly find myself doing so many different things! Life of a freelancer right? Haha! Besides acting and modeling, I also have begun to explore what goes on behind the scenes! When I first moved to LA, I was working a lot as a production assistant and was also on the project Bumblebee as Hailey Steinfeld’s Stand in. I made so many fun connections and learned absolutely so much while working as a PA and in fact, its what inspired me to dive deeper into BTS. I also picked up a little internship about a year into living in Los Angeles at BOLD films which was such a treat and increased my love for film and production too! This internship sparked the dream of directing hopefully in my later years.
Anyways, speaking of behind the scenes, I have been doing a bunch of art direction on set for campaigns recently; which includes casting for the shoot, styling the shoot and also assisting with the shot list/creative direction of the shoot. Boy oh boy do I love this. I am full-time Art Director of Extra Hours which is an agency run by a bunch of my best friends out in Laguna Beach and we have such a blast on set — it’s such a great time. I think If I could pick one aspect of myself as a company that I am most proud of, I would probably pick my sense of client relations! I love talking to people and nurturing those relationships like a little plant and it really is the one thing that fills me up. Now that I have begun casting for campaigns, I get to book people that I know and love and it’s a dream to be able to give them work as well. I think my purpose is something that sets me apart from others because I am fully just in it for love and the passion for the ability to grow creatively as an actress, model, Art Director and whatever else I decide to add to my plate. Lol! I am so grateful for every single opportunity that has come my way and even more grateful to be able to pour my heart into what I do.
Any shoutouts? Who else deserves credit in this story – who has played a meaningful role?
We have a really big team!!! I definitely would love to acknowledge Bianca Moors who introduced me to all of the right people in the film industry of Hawaii as well as sparked my true love for modeling. Of course, I would be silly to not give credit to my family who always have and always will continue to cheer me on. I’ve had countless friends and mentors and so many beautiful humans that believed in me and put me on. My friends and family at Extra Hours and Round Two Agency for pushing me to grow creatively and always mentally shape new, out of the box thoughts. Id love to thank my agencies as well who are always submitting me and booking some really iconic jobs as well- NTA in Los Angeles and Fenton Models in NYC. I would absolutely be nowhere without my sense of community and my little ecosystem and I am so stoked to watch it grow as new opportunities arise.
Instagrams for the agencies below!
@extrahrs
@roundtwoagency
Contact Info:
- Phone: 4153066528
- Email: alivialacelevie@gmail.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/Alivia
Image Credit:
Nathan Wahl, Grace Prock, Taylor Lauren, Stewart Clementz, Frankie Hildebrand, Jon Trend
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