Caitlin FitzGerald always finds a little bit of Maine, wherever she is.

She cornered Portland native Anna Kendrick at a party in London so she could talk about Maine with her. When the iconic true-life book “Lost on a Mountain in Maine” was made into a movie a few years ago, FitzGerald just knew she had to play the lost boy’s mother. She had read the book in grammar school, like most Maine kids.

And this year, while filming the second season of the Prime drama “We Were Liars” in Nova Scotia, FitzGerald was introduced to Elysia Roorbach, who will be playing the younger version of her character, Penny Sinclair. Roorbach grew up in Farmington, in Maine’s western mountains.

“I love Maine so much, it feels like such a part of who I am and it’s such a special place,” said FitzGerald, while filming in Nova Scotia this summer. “So it’s wonderful to meet people who understand.”

FitzGerald, 43, has traveled and worked all over the world during her 20-year career in film, TV and theater. She’s currently living in London and recently starred as Desdemona in a West End production of Shakespeare’s “Othello,” which was filmed and released to theaters in March.

She’s currently starring as one of the adult sisters of a wealthy, secrets-laden family in the Prime drama “We Were Liars,” based on the best-selling novel by E. Lockhart. The first season premiered in the summer of 2025 and the second season is slated for sometime next year. FitzGerald also had a recurring role on the hit HBO show “Succession,” playing Tabitha Hayes, girlfriend of Roman Roy (Kieran Culkin). About a decade ago, she played Libby Masters, the first wife of pioneering sex researcher William Masters, in the Showtime series “Masters of Sex.”

“We Were Liars” focuses on a wealthy family that spends the summer on a private island off the Massachusetts coast. FitzGerald’s character, Penny Sinclair, is the mother of Cadence Sinclair Eastman, part of a tightknit group called the Liars. Cadence suffers from memory loss due to a mysterious accident.

MAINE CONNECTIONS

The second season flashes back two decades, so new actors were cast to play the younger versions of the main characters. In a weird bit of Maine karma, Roorbach was cast to play the younger Penny. So there are two Maine actors on the show playing the same role. Earlier this year Roorbach made her TV debut playing an emergency room patient in two episodes of the hit HBO drama “The Pitt.”

FitzGerald said she didn’t know Roorbach, 26, until she was cast in “We Were Liars.” The two quickly found they had much in common, besides being from Maine. They both studied acting at New York University, and both did a semester abroad in London, focused on Shakespeare.

“There aren’t a lot of people from Maine in this industry, so it’s great that she’s here,” said FitzGerald of Roorbach. “I’m so pleased I get to work with her.”

FitzGerald lived in Lincolnville as a small child, then moved to Camden. Her father, Des FitzGerald, started a company called DuckTrap River Fish Farm, which became a nationally known purveyor of smoked fish. Her mother, Pam Allen, was the editor of a knitting magazine and started her own line of yarn, Quince & Co.

FitzGerald says she fell in love with acting in a kindergarten play, an adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s “How the Elephant Got his Trunk.” She got involved with area children’s theater productions, including at Camden Civic Theatre.

FitzGerald says she really wanted to study the craft of acting, instead of just driving to Los Angeles and looking for work, like many people do. She chose the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU because it combined classroom academics with stage training. Being from Maine, she says living in New York City during college was also an education.

Though she’s worked steadily for two decades, FitzGerald says her career has ebbed and flowed. One of her early breaks was being cast in the 2009 romcom “It’s Complicated,” starring Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin. She played Streep’s daughter.

“She was my hero, so I was definitely nervous to work with her, I had no idea what I was doing,” said FitzGerald. “I probably embarrassed myself a lot in front of her, but she was very generous.”

In one of those odd full-circle moments, FitzGerald is now sharing scenes with Streep’s daughter, Mamie Gummer. Gummer plays a sister of FitzGerald’s character on “We Were Liars.”

One of FitzGerald’s favorite roles was playing Libby Masters on “Masters of Sex” over four seasons. She says the writers created for her character “an amazing journey” from a typical 1950s housewife, who happens to be married to a sex researcher, to a more a indepedendent and complicated character. She eventually goes to Woodstock and also studies law.

But maybe her most personal role was playing the mother of Donn Fendler in “Lost on a Mountain in Maine.” Fendler was 12 when he got separated from his hiking party on Mount Katahdin in 1939 and survived nine days alone, lost in the woods.

The search for Fendler and his eventual rescue sparked stories in newspapers around the country. Within months, a book co-authored by Fendler and Joseph B. Egan, “Lost on a Mountain in Maine,” was published. For decades the book was taught in Maine schools as part of a lesson on Maine history. Fendler himself spoke to hundreds of classes and community groups over the years. He died in 2016, at the age of 90.

FitzGerald said she has vivid memories of the book, which portrays the danger, fear and hope of a young, lost boy. She said when her agent told her about the movie, and the part of Fendler’s mother, she said, “I have to do that one.”

Before opening in theaters nationally, the film premiered at the Maine International Film Festival in Waterville in the summer of 2024. FitzGerald attended the premiere and said she loved seeing so many teachers from around Maine who had taught the book to kids like her for years.

“It was such a lovely homegrown moment and I was really proud to be a part of it,” she said. “It was an honor to tell that story.”