For two seasons of Paramount+’s hit show School Spirits, singer Lizzy McAlpine played a pivotal role without ever being on set. Her song, "doomsday,” was featured in the final scene of season one, where we finally see the lead character Maddie’s (Peyton List) alive, inhabited body outside of the school. In season two, another one of her songs, “The Elevator,” was featured in a pivotal scene during episode 7 when Maddie and Wally (Milo Manheim) have sex for the first time, and Charley (Nick Pugliese) and Yuri (Miles Elliot) have a sweet moment complete with a pottery-filled Ghost reference.
Her impact on the show was so significant that Manheim, a good friend, thought it might be cool if she had a role on-screen. “I think Milo at one point was just like, ‘Oh my God, you should be on season three,’” McAlpine tells Teen Vogue over Zoom. “And I was like, ‘If you really want to make that happen, you can try to make that happen. I would be down, but it seems a little far-fetched to me.’”
Apparently, it wasn’t that out of left field, because Teen Vogue can exclusively reveal that McAlpine will be making her television acting debut in the new season. “I think he just talked to the writers, the creators, and they were down with the idea, and then they wrote a scene for me,” she says.
McAlpine is featured in a flashback during the third episode of season 3 (the first three episodes will be available for streaming on Paramount+ on Jan 28), and though she’s never been on a TV set, she did have some music video experience to pull from. “I did have to lip-sync to myself, which is basically like a music video. But in the scene, I was so nervous,” she admits. It’s surprising because not only does McAlpine tour around the world performing for an audience of adoring fans, but she’s also acted on one of the biggest stages in New York City. In 2025, she made her Broadway debut in the Lincoln Center Theater production of Floyd Collins – it was actually during this time when she met Manheim, who was starring in Little Shop of Horrors down the street. “[School Spirits] was just a new experience. I kind of just say yes to things so that I can push myself out of my comfort zone. That's something I love to do, even if it's terrifying.”
Pushing herself to act in addition to providing music for the show proved successful. Her character and her songs (or, in this case, her voice and performance) are integral to another transformative scene in the series. McAlpine sees this as one of the magical ways music can take on new meaning for its listeners, no matter the songwriter's intended meaning. “I mean, watching the ‘doomsday’ scene at the end of season one was so exciting. I just love that once I release music, it takes on a life of its own,” she says. “That could mean people interpret it in different ways or it is used just to underscore a scene or I see a lot of edits being made with my music, which I'm obsessed with on TikTok. I just love the way that my music can just be used in a lot of different contexts.”
Besides using music to frame emotional arcs, School Spirits also uses it to set the characters within specific high school archetypes and time frames. (Wally is the ‘80s jock, Rhonda is the cynical ‘60s artsy type). McAlpine’s character is a beatnik who attends Berkeley in Rhonda’s time, and she’s confident in herself and her views, which is evident as she gets up to perform a cover of an iconic song from the period.
It’s a point towards McAlpine’s acting skills because it's not quite the experience she had as a teen. “I was really shy, really, really shy. I didn't speak to really anyone, at least in the beginning of my high school experience. And even towards the end, I kind of just stayed to my group.”
With music, theater, television, choir, and all the other experiences that have shaped the 26-year-old, McAlpine is ready to take the opportunities like this one and turn them toward the future. “I want to act more,” she says. “And that's the blanket statement that I'm just putting into the universe because I feel like the best opportunities just come out of nowhere and I'm never expecting them.”
