Ed Burns Reveals Why The Brothers McMullen Sequel Took 30 Years to Happen (Exclusive)

30 years after The Brothers McMullen became an indie hit in 1995, writer, director and star Ed Burns is back with the heartfelt sequel The Family McMullen, which will be streaming on HBO Max on Dec. 5.

“Connie [Britton] and I were talking one day and said, ‘We’ve got to work together again.’ I told her I was thinking about a Brothers McMullen sequel, and she said, ‘Absolutely!”” Burns, 57, tells PEOPLE of his original cast mate, and of the sequel’s origin story.

“And so I tried writing it 15 years ago, and couldn’t crack it. I even wrote a prequel about the brothers in grammar school, but I couldn’t crack that either.” Then a magazine article caught his attention.

“I read an article about 20-somethings moving back home to save money, and I thought, okay, that’s a movie idea. When I started outlining it, I had a scene where these two adult kids come back to their single dad’s house, and they’re stating their case as to why they should move back home. And it reminded me of the scene in The Brothers McMullen where me and Mike McGlone’s character ask our older brother Jack if we could move back home, and that’s when it kind of hit me. I was like, oh, THIS is the sequel.”

While the first film followed adult brothers Barry and Patrick (Burns and Michael McGlone) and their older brother Jack as they navigated life and relationships after the death of their dad, this one tells the tale of Barry’s grown kids moving back home. His son Tommy (Pico Alexander) is over his tech job and wants to try his hand at acting, and his daughter Patty’s (Halston Sage) fiancé gets cold feet and calls off their wedding.

At the same time, little brother Patrick asks if he can move back in too, while he’s going through marital issues.

Barry is happy to have everyone under one roof again, and Burns (who is dad to college students Grace. 22. and Finn, 19) says he’d feel the same way if his own kids ever wanted to move back.

“In the film, that house represents not just a place to stay when you’re saving money, but the hangouts in the kitchen, all of that — those are nurturing experiences and fun, funny nights. That was my childhood home… I never moved back home, but I loved when we’d hang out in the kitchen, drinking beers and bullshitting all night. Those were great memories,” he says.

He continues, “Now that my kids are older — they’re both in college — we get to have those nights with them. It’s very reminiscent of that. So if they want to move back home, we’ll welcome them with open arms. I don’t know that they ever would, but we’d be happy if they did.”

Burns says that ultimately, his goal with The Family McMullen was to make a film that feels comforting.

“Look, I love a good dark drama,” he says. “But we’re getting an awful lot of dark stuff these days. I just felt like a holiday movie set around a family Thanksgiving where you can really sit back and laugh for two hours? I wanted it to feel like a warm cup of tea.”

He also adds that he misses the days of being able to go to the movie theater and catch an indie drama, like he used to when he was writing The Brothers McMullen.

“The Brothers McMullen was such a pivotal moment for me personally in my career, but also in the indie film scene,” he says. “I just love those characters. I don’t have a career if not for that film and those characters. But there isn’t really a theatrical audience for films like this anymore. Fortunately Warner Brothers and HBO Max came through and were the greatest partners to have. And luckily it is sort of the perfect rainy afternoon kind of movie to stream as a family.”

Speaking of family, he adds, “One of the things I wanted to play with in the film is that line Mike McGlone has at the end: ‘A lot of people say you can’t go home again.’ And I just kind of liked the idea that maybe you can’t go back in time, but you can go home again.”

The Family McMullen begins streaming December 5 on HBO Max.