Edie Falco is back! This time, the celebrated Brooklyn-native actress is gracing the big screen with an indie dramedy that will strike a nerve with distressed and messy families everywhere. As the lead heroine in I’ll Be Right There, Falco owns the role of Wanda — a mom, grandma-to-be, caring daughter, and sexually curious rebel as she navigates a community that seems to constantly pull her in all directions. We recently caught up with Falco to learn more about her acclaimed new film, plus updates on her next Avatar sequel, that highly anticipated Nurse Jackie sequel series and The Sopranos as a new docuseries about her beloved show also hits the masses.

Falco’s Wanda: ‘Testing the Waters’

I’ll Be Right There succeeds on multiple levels, particularly in the grounded feel of Wanda’s grown-up but neurotic family. “I am in real life, the mother of a son and a daughter, and you can’t help but draw on those things,” Falco told us in thinking about her role. “My kids are different from the pretend kids [in I’ll Be Right There], but parenting is kind of the same, you know, wondering how to help them, how best to help them, by getting in there and doing stuff for them, or stepping back and letting them figure stuff out on their own, what’s too much, what’s not enough, all that stuff.”

When she’s not dealing with her adult but childlike offspring, Wanda is navigating a brewing love-quadrilateral of sorts in her middle-aged living, between her ex (Bradley Whitford), current boyfriend (Michael Rapaport), ex-classmate/current neighbor (Michael Beach) and even a kinky fling with a younger woman (Sepideh Moafi). Says Falco:

“She’s at a point in her life when maybe the kids don’t need her quite as much, and she is wondering, like, ‘I’m divorced, and what do I want? You know, if ever there was a time to figure out what I like, this would be it.’ So I assumed that’s kind of what she was going through. And the fact that she didn’t have a lot relying on it, like, she wasn’t looking for someone to have kids with or, you know, she didn’t want someone to move into her house or whatever, makes it easier to just kind of test the waters, you know? What’s out there?”

It also helps that Falco was teaming up with an old pal who would direct I’ll Be Right There: filmmaker Brendan Walsh, who helmed a number of standout Nurse Jackie episodes. “I’ve known Brendan for a really long time, and I remember when I first got to know him on set, I was shocked by how young he was,” said Falco. “He was way younger than someone in his job would normally be. He was so much more mature. He was very chill about everything. He was always up for a laugh. Things can get very tense on a set where you’re trying to make the day, get all the work done, keep everyone happy. And he just never seemed to fret about it, you know? And that’s very valuable. So I liked having him around, always.”

On Joining the ‘Exquisite’ Avatar Franchise

And speaking of Nurse Jackie, fans simply cannot wait for the announced sequel series that Falco is attached to star in. “I was approached about it some time ago, and I was like, ‘Oh gosh, sure!” she told us. “The work environment is just exquisite. You know, I loved the people I worked with. We loved going to work. I just really loved working on that show, but then, after I say ‘yes,’ what happens after that? God knows… Once in a while, my agents will say, ‘Oh, that happened, then this happened, and then this happened.’ I’m like, all I can do is say ‘yes,’ and then either it will happen or but, you know? This has been ongoing for some time now, so I believe the writing is already taking place. So yeah, I would love it. It’d be great fun.”

Beyond Nurse Jackie, Falco is, of course, instantly recognizable from HBO’s The Sopranos, which is getting a behind-the-scenes docuseries Wise Guy: David Chase and The Sopranos, debuting this weekend. “It’s a very smart documentary, done by someone who really liked the show and cares about David, all kinds of stuff I didn’t know, you know, that was news to me, that I found really, really interesting,” said Falco. “It’s thrilling to me that there are people that care enough to watch that, you know, that they have allowed that show into their lives in that way, you know? I feel tremendously lucky.”

More recently on the big screen, Falco has also kept busy after joining James Cameron’s coveted Avatar franchise for The Way of Water and the upcoming threequel. Falco opened up to us about the experience thus far and her unique character:

”
It was written for a man
, and I forget who it was… might have been my agent… who said, ‘Well, you ever think about a woman for that role?’ Which is hysterical, but I love that they did, and I love that they thought of me. And it’s so out of my wheelhouse, as far as the type of movies that are made, but boy, what fun. I mean, the magnitude, the scale of the production and the hundreds of people working on it, and not to mention going to New Zealand for months at a time, was exquisite.”

From Brainstorm Media, I’ll Be Right There is now playing in theaters.