With The Fitzgerald Family Christmas, Burns returns to the working-class, Irish-American roots of The Brothers McMullen. Reuniting with McMullen co-stars Connie Britton (Friday Night Lights), and Mike McGlone, along with Noah Emmerich (Little Children, Beautiful Girls) and Kerry Bishe (Newlyweds, Red State), Burns seamlessly weaves an ensemble story of adult siblings dealing with the desire of their estranged father (Ed Lauter, The Artist, The Longest Yard) to return home for Christmas for the first time since he walked out on his family 20 years ago. Family rifts emerge, and like with any family, Christmas brings a mixed bag of complicated emotions and dynamics. Alliances form, old wounds are reopened or glossed over, and the possibility for a new hope and forgiveness emerges.