The 'Margo's Got Money Troubles' TV show is very good, and Rufi Thorpe agrees
Happy To Be Here
Greta Johnsen
4.8 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 17 April 2026
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Host Greta Johnsen talks to author Rufi Thrope, whose novel Margo’s Got Money Troubles was just adapted into a series on Apple TV+.
The show’s cast is stacked -- it stars Elle Fanning as Margo, a young woman who becomes pregnant after an affair with her college professor. She decides to keep the baby, much to the chagrin of her own single mom Shyanne, played by Michelle Pfeiffer. Margo’s absentee former pro wrestler dad, Jinx, is played by Nick Offerman.
Rufi and Greta talk about the magic of seeing a novel in a whole new dimension, what Rufi is working on next, and the utter absurdity of living with the cuddly monster known as the Bull Terrier.
SHOW CREDITS
Creator and host: Greta Johnsen
Senior Producer: Ben Goldberg
Composers: Ross Bellenoit and Jeremy Thal
Show art: Mac Maclean
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I would have been happy if they made a bad show. |
| 0:09.9 | Hello and welcome to Happy to Be Here, the show for recovering perfectionists and the perpetually curious about what to read, eat, watch, think about, and delight in wherever you might happen to be. |
| 0:22.1 | I'm your host, Greta Johnson, |
| 0:29.5 | and I am so excited that you are here. My guest today is the wonderful Rufi Thorpe. She wrote one of my favorite books of all time. It's called Margot's Got Money Troubles, and it has just been |
| 0:34.1 | adapted into an Apple TV Plus show. the first three episodes dropped earlier this week. |
| 0:40.4 | It stars Elle Fanning as Margo, who's a young woman who gets pregnant after a brief affair with her community college English professor. |
| 0:48.7 | He's married and also kind of a loser. |
| 0:51.2 | Margo decides to keep the baby. |
| 0:53.3 | And she soon realizes it is impossible to keep a |
| 0:56.2 | nine to five job while also raising a child. So she starts an OnlyFans account. If you don't know |
| 1:02.2 | what OnlyFans is, just Google it real quick. You'll figure it out. This TV show has an outstanding |
| 1:07.6 | cast. It also stars Michelle Pfeiffer as Cheyenne, Margot's well-meaning, but |
| 1:12.0 | generally unhelpful mother. And Nick Offerman is Jenks, Margot's absentee former pro wrestler, |
| 1:18.8 | dad, who's also a recovering addict. And we get some wonderful scenes with Greg Kinnear, who |
| 1:23.9 | plays Cheyne's churchy boyfriend. Rufie, welcome to the show. |
| 1:28.9 | I am so happy to be here. |
| 1:31.1 | Oh, perfect. |
| 1:32.8 | Well, God, I mean, I want to just congratulate you on this show. |
| 1:37.4 | I mean, it's such a rare feat to like not only just get something options. |
| 1:42.1 | Then for it to actually get made. |
| 1:43.9 | Exactly. Holy shit. And then with a cast like this, with such talented people at the helm, I mean, and it comes over me in waves that it's actually real, you know, because like it'll go to feeling kind of normal because it's part of your everyday existence. And then you'll be like, I can't believe this happened. I don't know. I feel like, especially as such a fan of the book, you know, like I would see your updates about the show and like even just the way I was tempering my own expectations where I'm like, well, just because they cast so-and-so doesn't mean it's actually going to become a thing. And like, I mean, it's wild to be talking to you about this right now. |
| 2:18.4 | And it all kind of happened so fast considering how long these things normally take to happen. |
... |
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