There is the familiar Emile de Ravin (Lost) or Mary Lynn Rajskub (24) of primetime TV, but when it comes to thrillers, Kelli Giddish is just now making its appearance. Giddish, a Southerner and former regular on All My Children, stars in Fox’s new series Past Life. The pilot preview airs Tuesday night, and the show moves to its usual time slot on Thursday. Giddish plays Dr. Kate McGinn, a New York psychologist who uses her clients’ pasts to solve their present mysteries. After a past-life regression in her twenties, Dr. McGinn is a believer in reincarnation and the supernatural, working alongside partner Price Whatley (Nicolas Bishop), a former New York cop who doesn’t share her beliefs. Together, sparks fly between the two personalities as they work to use clients’ past lives to unravel present cases. Our Alyssa Bailey was on a conference call with Giddish the other day, so read below for her report.

Photos courtesy of Fox

Giddish, an actress born and raised in Cumming, Ga., connected instantly with her character. “I felt like I didn’t have to take a lot away from myself,” she says. “[McGinn] gets people on her side [to allow for] her to heal them. I think as a Southern woman, you can kind of get in people’s heads in a way that maybe other people can’t.”

David Hudgins, the show’s executive producer and creator, says McGill is a very empathic character. She has this ability to connect with people and to read them and to understand them. She’s a healer, and that’s Kelli.” When Hudgins saw Giddish’s audition tape, he was “absolutely blown away” by the actress and flew her down to Baltimore, Md. for a screen test.

Giddish’s character, McGinn, works alongside Whatley in the series along with two other characters: Dr. Malachi Talmade (West Wing’s Richard Schiff), McGinn’s mentor and boss, and Dr. Rishi Karna (Ravi Patel of Transformers), the rookie of the group. Both characters have a unique relationship with McGinn, Hudgins says, with Talamade something of “the dad” and Karna “the younger brother to Kelli’s older sister.” McGinn’s partner, Whatley, is another case: “What’s great about Kelli and Nick Bishop is there is obviously chemistry. And it really translates onto the show.” Their relationship at the start is “strictly professional” with McGinn single and living at home with her dog and mother. But as the series continues, Hudgins teases, that may change. “I don’t think you can watch that character on screen and not say to yourself she’s going to end up with somebody at some point. She’s too great.”

The cast shot the series in Atlanta, which for Giddish was like coming home. The series was “such a joy” to shoot, and the actress particularly enjoyed working with the series’ guest stars, her character’s patients who also go through regressions. She was taken back notably by one actress, a 12-year-old girl who “knew more words to Beatles’ songs than I did. I was just so impressed. I was like youth is not lost. They are not lost; they’re OK.”

Giddish’s own youth has taken her all over. A standout in her high school theater, Giddish studied the performing arts at the University of Evansville in Indiana. After graduation, she moved to New York, starring alongside Farrah Fawcett in the ill-fated Broadway show Bobbi Boland. In 2005, the actress was cast as Di Henry on the TV soap All My Children. The experience was a testing ground. “You think on your feet when you’re on a soap,” she admits, “You better know what [your character] would do in every situation.” The experience was much different on Past Life. “It was so nice to move out of that small box of a studio and actually get to incorporate everybody’s ideas. It’s a whole other machine.”

For Giddish, the hype behind past lives fascinated her. “It’s kind of been interesting to see how much of an interest there is in this stuff.” Whether the actress herself believes in past lives is another story. However, she believes that acting is “almost an exact parallel, really. I mean every project you’re involved in, you learn a message from that experience. You kind of learn something, and you get to apply it to the next thing.”