Anya Taylor-Joy’s Lucky Is Based On A Book About A Scammer Family

For the first time since 2020’s Emmy-winning hit The Queen’s Gambit, Anya Taylor-Joy is back on TV. She’s the star and executive producer of Lucky, the new Apple TV series based on Marissa Stapley’s 2021 novel of the same name. It follows a born-and-raised con artist — the titular Lucky — on a cross-country quest for survival and redemption as her scams start to catch up with her.

“I was so attracted to playing somebody who was just so desperate to stay still and put down roots and form some kind of attachment where she didn’t feel like the ground was going to fall away from underneath her,” Taylor-Joy told L’Officiel of her scrappy character. “I think there’s been such a glorification of the hustle and the con, where we see it as very slick and jazzy and sexy. I was intrigued by the idea of, What is this actually like if you can’t form any attachments to anybody?”

As the journey unfolds — new episodes air on Wednesdays through Aug. 19 — here’s a quick look at the thrilling plot summary and book ending of Lucky.

The book begins with baby Lucky being dropped off at a church. As a nun attends to the child’s mysterious arrival, a man walks up and introduces himself as the baby’s father. He explains the mother was in crisis, and he takes the little one home with him.

That man, John, would grow up telling Lucky that her mother, Gloria, left their family. John raises Lucky to be a scammer just like him, though she is hurt by the constant lying and moving around. At one point, they become close with a widowed mom and her daughter — only to leave in the middle of the night after swindling them.

When Lucky is a teenager, John goes to jail for his role in a money laundering scheme. She develops a relationship with Cary, the son of John’s accomplice, Priscilla. A decade later, Lucky and Cary — scammers themselves — plan to flee the country for Dominica. But before they make a clean break, Cary betrays Lucky and leaves her alone in Las Vegas.

Meanwhile, Lucky has a winning lottery ticket for nearly $400 million, but she knows that if she turns it in, she will be caught for her crimes.

Unsure of what to do, she visits her dad in prison and her old friend, Steph, while wearing a disguise. She also sees Priscilla, who now runs a shelter for women (seemingly another front) and makes clear she plans to use Lucky to find any money her son left behind. Lucky escapes with her dog Betty, who Priscilla had taken before Cary’s disappearance, and Reyes, another former associate, helps her get to New York to finally meet Gloria, the mom who disappeared.

Only, Gloria is not Lucky’s mom! She explains that John once came home with a baby he found on the street and then left. Gloria steals Lucky’s ticket — and to get it back, Lucky finds an unlikely ally in her actual mother, a district attorney named Valerie. It’s revealed that Valerie is the one who relinquished Lucky as a teen mom. Keen to help her newfound daughter, she tracks down the ticket to Priscilla, who had searched for Gloria and stolen it from her.

Lucky works with authorities to catch both Cary and Priscilla, and her winning ticket is held in a trust that will be used to pay back her victims.