When Suzanne is ready to return to work, her agent informs her that the studio's insurance policy will cover her only if she lives with a "responsible" individual—such as her mother Doris.

Amid these struggles, Suzanne learns that the paternalistic director Lowell Kolchek has more work for her as long as she stays sober.

In discussing adapting the book for the screen, director Mike Nichols commented, "For quite a long time we pushed pieces around, but then we went with the central story of a mother passing the baton to her daughter.

"[2] Nichols began pre-production in New York, where he assembled a group of actors to run lines from the script in order to perfect it.

"[2] In the DVD commentary, she notes that her mother wanted to portray Doris, but Nichols cast Shirley MacLaine instead.

The website's critics consensus reads, "Uniting a pair of powerhouse talents with a smart, sharply written script, Postcards from the Edge makes compelling drama out of reality-inspired trauma.

"[8] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 71, based on 18 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.

[10] Vincent Canby of The New York Times said the film "seems to have been a terrifically genial collaboration between the writer and the director, Miss Fisher's tale of odd-ball woe being the perfect material for Mr. Nichols's particular ability to discover the humane sensibility within the absurd.

"[12] Hal Hinson of The Washington Post said, "Meryl Streep gives the most fully articulated comic performance of her career, the one she's always hinted at and made us hope for."