After working on a pair of short films ("Number One Fan" 1997 and "Second Skin" 1998), Fitzgerald landed the high profile role of a Hassidic scholar whose wife (Renee Zellweger) harbors desires beyond the community in "A Price Above Rubies" (1998). He had a pivotal role as a co-worker with romantic designs on Olivia Williams in the Oscar-nominated Best Picture "The Sixth Sense" (1999) and delivered a nicely nuanced turn as the sensitive younger son of a farmer struggling to hold on to his property in "What Happened to Tully/The Truth About Tully" (2000). In "Finding Forrester" (also 2000), Fitzgerald was cast as an aide who delivers groceries and other sundries to a reclusive man he does not realize is a well-known author. The actor was back at Sundance in 2001 with two high profile independents: the award-winning "The Believer" and "Series 7". In the former, he was a neo-Nazi who carries out an assassination, while the latter offered Fitzgerald his richest role (to date) as a cancer survivor with a death wish selected to participate in a reality-based TV show where it is literally kill or be killed.