I recently wrote about Felicia Day’s new audiobook Third Eye, an Audible original that released in October. Lucky for me, I also got the chance to interview her via Zoom for GeekMom and discussed Third Eye, being a creator, and the things she and her daughter are enjoying. Here’s some of the fun highlights from our interview.
Third Eye was originally pitched as a television show, but was turned down by Hollywood.
Day: I was so devastated because I genuinely love the idea of a failed Chosen One with a roommate who’s a vampire and a fairy, and I just I couldn’t let it go, and when I got the opportunity to approach Audible about it, I just was so excited that they wanted to take a chance on it and then COVID hit and I was like “go make seven hours of content – do it.” So, it was quite an interesting experience to not only write for audio, but write something like ten episodes of television at once, and then figure out how to do it all on audio form. It was a wonderful learning curve that made me, you know, want to go back to the format because, yeah, I have stories that Hollywood won’t tell, and I just wanna get them out there and this is like the first hopefully of many.
On the cast of Third Eye and if any roles were designed for specific people:
Day: I mean I will be honest, of course I had a dream that Neil Gaiman would play the narrator, and I wrote the part of Robigus for Wil Wheaton, but of course I’m not gonna tell anybody that before because you never know if it’s gonna get made, or if they’ll they’ll wanna say “yes.” I don’t want to pressure them, but at the end of the day for sure I got a dream cast. I knew almost all the cast first hand. I did have a casting director who actually helped me cast The Guild come in and then help me with some of the smaller parts. London Hughes who plays Sybil Aurora Moonglow, my flighty fairy best friend, she was the only person I hadn’t worked with before or wasn’t aware of, and I described the character I needed to my friend Jonah Ray, who stars in Mystery Science Theater but he also directs that and he voice directed this, and he was like “Oh, I have the perfect comic for you, she’s from the UK, here’s a clip” and I saw thirty seconds of it YouTube video I was like “Oh! Can we get her please?”
On the chance of a Third Eye sequel:
Day: I was expressly given the mandate to write a standalone story, so I 100% can assure anybody listening that if you only listen to this and this is your journey with the characters, you’ll be satisfied and hopefully entertained. I could definitely see going other places with the characters, you know like they’re so vivid in my mind, I kind of give a hint of where we can go next season.
On advice she would give herself for her creator journey:
Day: I would say “enjoy the process more.” You know, either in success or failure or just the process of making something. I think I really speed through life in a way and the success of some of my earlier work like The Guild, and I was always frantic to get to the next step, and I never really appreciated, you know, what we were doing and the success of it and the collaboration and all of it.
She also admitted she probably should have been easier on herself.
Third Eye was written over four years, so she got to enjoy the process more.
Day: So like, I had plenty of time to iron out the kinks and, you know, refine stuff and add little jokes here, and you know, not rushing all the time was just such a healing process for me, so yeah, slow down.
Some of the best advice she received was hearing she didn’t have to work so hard from Bruce Miller.
Day: This resonates with me so, so vividly because I wish I had just set the time like to absorb that because I could have done less better, and I could have again enjoyed myself more and not broken myself for things that weren’t that important.
On how much more she knows Los Angeles because of her daughter:
Day: I live in Los Angeles it’s a huge city with all sorts of interesting things. Not until I needed to amuse a child, did I go and see that park or that museum, and yes, my life is so much richer.
On making your hobby your job:
Day had a huge stress breakdown with Geek & Sundry when more content was needed to try to keep the business numbers happy, but did have advice to share on making both sides happy when you make your hobby your job.
Day: I think what’s important if you make your hobby your business is to separate the business and your hobby. Like when people are like “I love dice, I’m gonna make a dice business,” I’m like, “do you know how to do the accounting? Do you know the tax laws? Do you know how to manage people?” Go take some classes, go literally to a community college because if I had just done that early on, I would have been so much better at being able to say “hey! I can’t do this part, or at least I know a little bit enough to hire the right person to do this part.
On the roles that made her grow the most:
The Guild was significant in her growing as a creator.
Day: I was so frightened of making something, the idea that we were going to shoot something with a camera and make something was absolutely terrifying, and so the idea that we could keep doing that was out of…it was just out of control, but when I first started uploading videos and saw people respond, I was like “Oh my God, for the first time I feel validated. I feel like people see me for who I am, and I’m showing them something they like. We can’t stop making this.”
Charlie on Supernatural was also significant for her as an actor.
Day: There was an episode of Supernatural I had to play a good and evil version of myself, and it was super challenging, but at the end of the day, I think I got to know that character way better, and I grew as an actor.
On who she would love to work with:
Day: I’d love to work with Taika Waititi. I mean, like his world is like so incredible. I mean anything he does, his sensibility like he really made it okay to be a little silly and a little more gentle with humor.
On upcoming projects your kids might like:
Day has a graphic novel in 2025 that she wants to write for her daughter “as a teen.” She also emphasizes that the mentor relationship in Third Eye was something she wanted out there for her daughter.
Day: The idea that two women from different ages can learn from each other, support each other, and help each other grow to be the best version of themselves, I think it’s really important that mentor relationship because a lot of the times there isn’t, you know, an older, you know, mother figure that has a realized life. They’re just kind of an accessory to the journey of the younger character, and I think that sort of sells women short. You know, we definitely, the stories of women who are not, you know after thirty, is like few and far between and it’s, they’re very pretty cookie cutter and they’re not as nuanced or they’re super serious like you know I really wanted to represent sort of an ideal mentors relationship between two: a girl and a woman in a way that was very loving and that’s kind of the heart of Third Eye.
On my suggestion of Laurel having Gifted Kid Syndrome:
Day: You know what, that was very insightful because that was the core of what I wanted to write. I was a gifted kid, I was a violin prodigy. I was kind of a prodigy of the Internet later, and the idea of being a failure was just so strong in my head especially when I had burnout, and I kind of didn’t rise to the…my company didn’t like become this multi…you know what, I don’t even know what I thought I was gonna do, but yeah, you’re absolutely right. When I was writing Laurel and breaking down her character, I studied prodigy syndrome and gifted child syndrome a lot and identified it a lot of in my own behavior, but I also was able to put that in there as sort of a resonate theme and also something to just kind of just help me to process like getting to a point where you like yourself outside of that.
On fun media that Felicia and her daughter are into:
Felicia admits that her busy schedule puts her behind on the TV shows she’d love to catch up on like The Bear, although she hopes to do that over the holidays. She also loves the genre of Lit RPG Books. She watches a lot Christmas baking shows with her daughter who also enjoys Horrible Histories and a lot of Netflix educational shows like Emily’s Wonder Lab.
Upcoming Projects:
Felicia has some awesome upcoming projects to look for including the graphic novel in 2025, a feature audio project next year, and two stage things (one being a musical of The Guild). She also has indie film Tim Travers and the Time Travelers Paradox and a short for George R.R. Martin that should hopefully be hitting festivals.
