Carey Mulligan on the rise

It’s hard to imagine a hotter name bouncing around casting circles than that of 24-year-old Jean Seberg-like waif Carey Mulligan, who skyrocketed out of Sundance last January with her touching and magnetic performance as a schoolgirl in love with a cad in the award-winning “An Education.”

Several years ago, Mulligan was just such a schoolgirl (OK, perhaps not as naive) with a passion for acting, when her headmistress invited “Gosford Park” screenwriter Julian Fellowes to speak at her high school. Afterward, Mulligan called up Fellowes, who invited the enterprising student to meet him and his wife, and later introduced her to a casting director. Soon after, Mulligan was cast as the flighty Kitty Bennet in 2005’s “Pride & Prejudice,” as well as a raft of British TV shows (“Bleak House,” “Doctor Who”) before making a name for herself in an acclaimed staging of “The Seagull.”

For “An Education,” which hits theaters in October and is set in 1960s London, Mulligan convincingly lost five years. “I looked ridiculously young. I always thought I looked more grown-up,” she says, explaining that she got some unexpected help in the reverse-aging department. “When you actually put on the school uniform, suddenly the entire crew starts treating you as if you were 16.”

The hoopla surrounding Sundance certainly surprised her. “The week before, I was really panicking,” she explains. “I’d never been to the Sundance Film Festival. I’d never done publicity. It was the first time I had even been the lead in a movie and there was no assurance that the film would even sell. It was crazy.” “An Education” wound up one of the biggest acquisitions of the festival, selling for $3 million.

Mulligan has small roles in Michael Mann’s “Public Enemies” and Jim Sheridan’s upcoming “Brothers” and has recently reteamed with Keira Knightley for the sci-fi drama “Never Let Me Go.”

-- Rachel Abramowitz