Onstage, Jessie Fisher has an uncanny ability to tap into wisdom and wonder at once. It’s a duality that will serve her well as the audience’s guide through Every Brilliant Thing. The solo work, written by English playwright Duncan Macmillan, sees its protagonist ask for the audience’s help to catalog reasons to be happy — a list the character begins as a child in response to a parent’s suicide attempt.

“This will be the fourth one-person show I’ve been part of, and each time, I say, ‘I’m never going to do that again,’ ” Fisher says. “I’ve been trying to answer for myself why I’m drawn to them, besides just being a challenge. And I think this piece answers the question, which is that it feels like a community experience.” Fisher will engage directly with audience members, many of whom will be given cues for “brilliant things” to suggest. “It lets you share how good it is to be of use in someone else’s story, the way that actors get to do every night.”

Every Brilliant Thing marks a homecoming for the Highland Park native — it’s her first time on a Chicago-area stage since 2018, as she’s been busy working in Broadway productions like Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. She calls this play “a culmination of everything I’ve done in Chicago,” from musicals and improv training at iO and the Annoyance to deeply grounded work at Steppenwolf. “It really provides the opportunity to be like, ‘This is unrepeatable. This is this room’s experience. It will not be the same again.’ ”

Every Brilliant Thing runs October 31 to January 5 at Writers Theatre.