After an especially hectic autumn, Margo Martindale is looking forward to some holiday downtime after Friday, when her "The Millers" goes on a two-week break. She's been going back and forth between production of the CBS comedy in which she stars with Will Arnett, J.B. Smoove and Beau Bridges — and promotional chores for "August: Osage County," the big-screen dark drama in which she's part of a dream cast including Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Ewan McGregor, Abigail Breslin, Chris Cooper, Sam Shepard and Dermot Mulroney.

"I have been promoting the film for about a month and a half. It has been a rigorous, rigorous schedule for me," notes the hugely gifted actress, who finally began getting her due with her 2011 Emmy win for playing criminal family matriarch Mags Bennett in "Justified." "We had our premiere in New York last week, our premiere in L.A. this week.

"It was a joy to be with those people," adds Martindale, speaking of the cast that lived in a condominium village in the hamlet of Bartlesville, Okla., last year, while the movie, directed by John Wells, was being made. And as far as the production itself, "Everywhere you turned, to know someone was there that was a full-on, full-blown character. It was really like being in a family that happened to be delivering scripted lines."

Martindale, who has a grown daughter with her husband, musician Bill Boals, says she'll be "staying in New York for Christmas. We usually have a big group Christmas Eve. It will be smaller this year. One of my friends, my dear friends, died and another group of friends is out here in L.A. and won't be coming back. So, it will be small but very sweet. We go to church, and we go home and open gifts. Christmas day is a very slow day. Then we take all the Christmas tree and everything down by New Years' and then on New Year's Day, we eat black-eyed peas.

"You have to have 'em," emphasizes the Jacksonville, Texas-born actress, speaking of the Southern New Year's good luck victuals. "I make them from scratch and then invite people over to eat. They're very easy — I soak them overnight, and then I put onion and garlic and usually some kind of ham hock in them. I have a bunch of condiments I put in them. I love black-eyed peas. I can't eat them all the time, but I have a big bowl on New Year's Day."

With a show she enjoys — the improved "The Millers" has new episodes coming up beginning Jan. 2 that she deems hilarious — and all her movie action, Martindale seems awfully lucky even without the peas. Perhaps there will be Oscar luck in the New Year as well? Streep and Roberts are already up for Golden Globes for "August: Osage County," which opens Christmas Day. Martindale simply says, "I'm happy for anyone who gets nominated for an Oscar."

She also has the feature adaptation of "Heaven is For Real" on the way for Easter time release. It would be hard to find two more different films — the "August" drama that revolves around sisters in a dysfunctional family reuniting after a suicide, and the "Heaven" movie from the 2010 best-seller "Heaven is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back," in which Christian Pastor Todd Burpo recounts (with co-author Lynn Vincent) his son's stories of what he saw during a near-death experience.

"I'll be curious to see how people react to that. I loved doing it. I love Randall Wallace who directed it," says Martindale of the filmmaker who rose to fame for writing "Braveheart." "I love Greg Kinnear and Kelly Reilly. It's very thought provoking, that movie. It will make people talk, I hope."