Michelle Pfeiffer as a former Hooters waitress! Elle Fanning as an adult-content creator! TV queen Nicole Kidman as a pro wrestler turned lawyer, pigtails and bedazzled leotard included!
In the offbeat Margo’s Got Money Troubles, premiering Wednesday, April 15, on Apple TV, Fanning is the titular Margo, a student whose dreams of being a writer are derailed when her English professor (Michael Angarano) gets her pregnant. She’s cast out of her college life and must start anew with limited help from her mother, Shayanne (Pfeiffer). Because of the aforementioned money troubles, Margo’s pretty desperate, so she decides to set up an OnlyFans account to make some cash. Turns out, she’s really quite good at it!
There are certainly some NSFW scenes over the series’ eight episodes, which are based on Rufi Thorpe’s bestselling 2024 novel and adapted by David E. Kelley. But this is mostly just a typical family dramedy, with a truly all-star cast: Nick Offerman plays Margo’s deadbeat wrestler dad, Jinx, who’s trying to make up for lost time with his new grandbaby. Greg Kinnear is perfect as Shayanne’s religious boyfriend, Kenny. And Kidman — when she isn’t having her fun decked out in arena-ready spandex — advises the family on legal matters while rocking another memorable wig to add to her collection. Not everything about the show works, but it brings us into a spirited, memorable little world — one that’s a blast to drop(kick) into.
Below, see what other critics are saying about Margo’s Got Money Troubles, which currently has a 95 percent on Rotten Tomatoes.
The Daily Beast: “Apple TV’s latest is a frustratingly rigged game. Making arguments about parenthood, family, and pornography that only work because its every detail has been carefully engineered to eschew reality, Kelly’s new series … is a feel-good story that’s predicated on, and sabotaged by, its fairy-tale fantasy.”
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The Hollywood Reporter: “The David E. Kelley series would seem to have all the hallmarks of an aggressively quirky family drama, the sort where everyone seems adorably odd but also not quite real. Look closer, however, and Margo’s Got Money Troubles reveals itself to be something else. Its characters are memorable, sure, and their family relationships [are] a bit unconventional. But this is a story firmly grounded in the real world, and all the more interesting for it.”
TV Guide: “Maybe it shouldn’t feel so novel for a show with a sex worker as its title character to treat nudity with such unsexy frankness, but it’s that novel quality that makes Margo’s Got Money Troubles such a compelling watch. … How many stories that are theoretically meant to examine female sexuality actually end up as exploitative trauma porn? At every turn, it remains a story about a normal person working to provide for her child. That frank attitude isn’t always shared by the characters, which grants the show a lived-in authenticity.”
