From a very young age, Lilah Fitzgerald has been a storyteller, whether it’s bringing characters to life on tv shows like The CW’s “HELLCATS” or escaping into her own imagination.
Her latest feat is giving life to the character of Ava on AMC’s new series LUCKY HANK. The dramedy follows Hank (Bob Odenkirk), an English professor in crisis.
In addition to taking on the role of Ava, Lilah will be stepping back into “Ghoulia’s” platform heels in MONSTER HIGH 2, the sequel to Paramount+ and Nickelodeon’s monster hit.
In between telling these stories, Lilah has managed to write her own. On April 4th, her debut futuristic YA fantasy novel, Stars & Swashbucklers hit shelves.
We sat down with Lilah to chat about her acting, writing, and what’s next for this storyteller.
Excerpt from the podcast:
What drew you to the role of Ava in LUCKY HANK?
Originally, what got me excited about it was seeing that Bob Odenkirk was attached because looking at the breakdown, seeing our producers, seeing our writers, seeing the directors, I immediately knew this is going to be an amazing TV show. I really am drawn to projects that feel human and feel natural and feel real. That’s my favorite thing to do. So getting to do that in the audition and then managing to book the role and do it for AMC was really a dream come true for me.
In between filming, you have somehow managed to also write your debut, YA Fantasy novel Stars and Swashbucklers. Can you give us a brief synopsis of the book?
Yes. It takes place in a futuristic world where Earth has broken. It’s called the Broken World, and basically now there’s just islands floating between the stars. Ships sail the stars like like we sail the sea right now, and there’s privateers that search for mystical relics. We are focusing on, Anya Marcox, who is an average 16 year old girl who wants nothing more than to be a privateer. She is stuck in class two aboard a luxury cruise airship when she learns of a mystical relic that could change the fate of the islands, and she ends up in the middle of this underworld of privateers and royalty and dark dealings and rebels as she tries to find the relic and prove that she has what it takes to be a privateer.
What inspired the book?
The inspiration for the book in and of itself was a dream. I had this really cool dream of this world I wanted to go back to and live in, and it was so visual for me that I didn’t really intend it to become a book, but then it did. Reading it back, what’s interesting for me is I have OCD and seeing how that worked its way in as the evil magic piece can be seen as a fantasy version of OCD. Now the inspiration going forward is writing books that can help teens who are struggling with mental health and struggling with reality and struggling with a very, very hard time in life to see their struggles played out in a fantastical world where they can slay their OCD like they would slay a dragon.
Listen to the rest of the podcast here!