NM LIVE with Teal Sherer
April’s Guest: Tony Award winner Ali Stroker

Ali Stroker made history as the first actor who uses a wheelchair to appear on Broadway and again when she won a Tony Award in 2019 for playing Ado Annie in the revival of Oklahoma! She has guest starred in TV shows like Glee and Blue Bloods and played disability rights activist Judy Heumann in Drunk History.

Now, Stroker can add author to her list of accomplishments. The Chance to Fly, which she co-wrote with Stacy Davidowitz, is a middle-grade novel about a theater-loving girl who uses a wheelchair and her quest to defy expectations. In our interview, Stroker shares what it was like writing a book that is personal to her and reveals her favorite performance mishap. Stroker, who got engaged last year, also weighs in on the term “interabled.” Watch the full NM Live online at bit.ly/3980Fu4. The Chance to Fly is available wherever you buy books. Meanwhile, here are five quick Q’s for Stroker:

While writing The Chance to Fly, what helped you get in a middle school mindset?
I got to share my middle school experiences with my writing partner Stacy! It helped me remember how exciting and devastating everything felt, and how I was experiencing so many feelings and moments for the first time.

Dream scene partner?
Jake Gyllenhaal

What’s on your bucket list?
Make exciting, important art on stage and screen, buy a home and have a family!

In Lifetime’s Christmas Ever After, you play Izzi Simmons, a romance novelist. If you wrote a romance novel, what would the title be?
Backstage Love

The best advice you’ve gotten from a fellow wheelchair user?
“Own it, girl.”

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