‘Margot’s Got Money Troubles’ is Actual Money for Apple+

The Apple+ dramedy Margot’s Got Money Troubles, based on a popular novel by Rufi Thorpe and now ending an extremely successful first season, is a radical TV document of modern feminism, but not in the way that you might think. In the pilot, the least-successful of the six episodes aired so far, a weaselly college English professor impregnates his star student, Margot Millet, played with extraordinary vulnerability by Elle Fanning. But in an era where the bourgeois liberal press bombards women with messages about how “having children will ruin your  life,” Margot chooses to have the baby and refuses to compromise her life because of her choice.

Her decision to have and keep her son, pretentiously but very-much-in-characterly named Bodhi, turns out to be the catalyst that launches her to be the best possible, most creative, and most attractive version of herself, even if that self ends up making quirky videos on OnlyFans and TikTok. There’s a little something here for people of every political stripe. She doesn’t have an abortion, she doesn’t need a man — at least not as a romantic partner — and she won’t let her mistakes define her future or her creative output. In every way, no matter the consequences, she’s her own boss, even if her workplace is really modern and bizarre. In the show’s cosmology, having a child, while still extremely difficult, challenging, and expensive, is also the ultimate creative act, in every way.

But regardless of the elevator pitch, with most shows like this, success rises and falls with the writing and the cast, both of which are excellent. The scripts give characters room to breathe, and to say and do surprising and interesting things. Sometimes the characters are broad, and maybe a touch twee, but they’re always recognizably human. Margot’s remembers that TV, at its core, is about people you want to spend time with in your living room for an hour here and there. I would spend time with any of these characters; I might even buy them a drink.

Fanning carries the show effortlessly. She’s a remarkably gifted and intelligent actress with huge range, as her well-deserved Oscar-nominated for Sentimental Value shows. But in the same year, she also played android robot twins in a Predator movie, and was great in that role as well. Her Margot is perfect: naïve but wise, pathetic but inspiring, smart and sexy. But her appeal doesn’t come from her boob shots or butt-wagging dances — though there are a lot of those — but rather from her good humor and intelligence. In the hands of a lesser performer, this show could have been a huge turkey.

Only a legendary screen actress could top Fanning here, and this show has one, in the form of Michelle Pfeiffer, giving a late-career defining performance as Margot’s mother Shyanne, a former Hooters waitress who now works at Bloomingdale’s and is set to marry an earnest and kind but naïve Christian man played by Greg Kinnear, also doing his best work in a long time. But Pfeiffer smashes this role way out of the stadium. Shyanne is noble and damaged, vain but also modest, a former bad girl about to marry a good man who keeps his socks on while he has sex. Her every gesture is considered but natural, her every line perfectly timed. As many others have said, give the Emmy to her already.

Also excellent is Nick Offerman, as Margot’s birth father, a former professional wrestler and recovering heroin addict who moves in with Margot and her cosplay-loving roommate to essentially become Bodhi’s “manny,” allowing Margot to pursue her weird creative dreams. He wasn’t there for her as a child, but he’s really there for her now. Offerman is just the right mix of warmth, pathos, and barely suppressed rage. The show’s cast is so deep that Nicole Kidman and Marcia Gay Harden have very supporting roles: Kidman as as a former pro wrestler, Harden as a villainous rich lady sporting a Cruella DeVille haircut.

This is a show about sex positivity. In that, it resembles Season One of Sex Education, a show on Netflix that began with extreme promise but began to degrade in subsequent seasons. That program made stars out of Emma Mackey, Aimee Lou Wood, and Ncuti Gatwa, among others. “Margot” has no stars to make, except maybe from its supporting cast. But it does have a lot to say about modern sexuality, which it mostly finds amusing.

It’s fine to not be judgmental about OnlyFans, but the show tends to remain overly optimistic, though not completely in the dark about the dangers of public exposure. Still, whatever complications arrive are a far cry from the OnlyFans degradations that Sydney Sweeney endures on OnlyFans for the current season of Euphoria. Margot’s doesn’t embrace the darkness, which is fine, but it’s a little gee-whiz about Margot’s choices. On the other hand, Margot’s pluck and resourcefulness gives the show its appeal. You want to see this young woman succeed, at work, at parenthood, and in life.