What to stream this week: Elle Fanning’s gutsy sex work dramedy, plus five more new picks

This week’s picks include a deeply watchable dramedy starring Elle Fanning and Michelle Pfeiffer, a Netflix crime comedy from Schitt’s Creek co-creator Dan Levy, and a crude and cuddly Hollywood satire from Jonah Hill.

Margo’s Got Money Troubles ★★★★ (Apple TV)

Genuinely engaged with both drama and comedy, this star-studded American series, and the fiercely felt central performances that underpin it, is a master-class in engagement. You might baulk at the undercurrent of whimsy or quibble at the sudden harshness of certain circumstances, but Margo’s Got Money Troubles is deeply watchable.

The key, quite possibly, is that as affirming as it is with regard to family strength and the love between parent and child, it’s also willing to embrace painful failings and lingering doubts. The aesthetic is bright, but the show is gutsy.

It begins with an informal education. Margo (Elle Fanning) is a budding 19-year-old writer just beginning to show her way at a local Californian college. The first fan of her writing is her professor, Mark (Michael Angarano), a married father of two who swiftly becomes Margo’s lover. This ends when she decides to keep an unplanned pregnancy. “I don’t celebrate this tragedy,” laments Margo’s mother, Shyanne (Michelle Pfeiffer), a former Hooters waitress who raised Margo alone after her father, professional wrestler Jinx (Nick Offerman), shot through.

Confronting the past’s mistakes even as they threaten to repeat is just one of the themes this limited series grapples with. In adapting Rufi Thorpe’s 2024 novel, the prolific David E. Kelley has mixed together his back catalogue, albeit leaning more towards Ally McBeal than Big Little Lies. The emotional stakes are quite real, and the humour is illuminating. Often what you’re laughing at also registers as unresolved pain. It’s the only way the characters can carry the burden.

Without being didactic, the show is clear-headed about Margo’s struggles. It’s frank about the physical and mental cost expended by new mothers, before the economic hardships kick in. Without childcare for baby Bodhi, Margo has to quit school and loses her waitressing gig. Her solution, borne of necessity but given life by her imagination, is an account on OnlyFans, the subscription-based platform for adult content. She finds a means of expression and income, and the show is sex work-positive even as some of Margo’s circle judge her.

As the lead, Fanning signal boosts everything her character experiences; the camera is her amplifier. It’s raw, but authentic. Her performance is undeniable. The parental turns of Pfeiffer and Offerman provide terrific foils – the former is sharp-edged and haunted by regrets, while the latter emanates fragility from his bearded bulk as a rehabbed addict desperate to make amends. They are a flawed family, but hopeful. That, and Nicole Kidman as their unconventional lawyer, gives them a welcome shot against life’s heartbreaks.

Big Mistakes ★★½ (Netflix)

Created by Dan Levy (Schitt’s Creek) and Rachel Sennott (I Love LA), this crime comedy is about a pair of New Jersey siblings whose rash act leads to their blackmail by Russian gangsters, who put the panicked duo to questionable work. It’s a fish-out-of-water piece, heavy on menacing farce with lots of unhinged screaming as events spiral out of control, and lucky escapes. The eight episodes are awkwardly structured, but the crucial flaw is foundational: the crime angle feels forced.

Throughout the show, I wanted more of the everyday lives lived by Nicky (Levy) and Morgan Dardano (Taylor Ortega). He’s a gay pastor who has kept his church happy with a pledge of celibacy, hence his boyfriend Tareq (Jacob Gutierrez) is a big secret, while she’s an actor turned primary school teacher whose needy boyfriend, Max (Jack Innanen), has the maturity of her students. These are the issues I wanted the duo to wrestle with, not a cocaine smuggling scheme involving Brazilian livestock.

One big tick is the presence of the unimpeachable Laurie Metcalf as the pair’s no-nonsense mother, whose mayoral campaign for their home town is one of several plots running adjacent to Nicky and Morgan’s mishaps. There is a tighter, nuanced exploration of obligation and assertiveness lurking inside Big Mistakes, with deeper characterisations. In terms of a concept, less here might actually have been more.

Outcome ★★½ (Apple TV)

In terms of satires about Hollywood’s collective narcissism and celebrity’s cruelty, there’s not a lot left to be said. Actor and filmmaker Jonah Hill opts for volume and tonal switches in this black comedy about a movie star, Reef Hawk (Keanu Reeves), who, accompanied by longtime friends Kyle (Cameron Diaz) and Xander (Matt Bomer), has to revisit his past to find out who is blackmailing him. With Hill as Reef’s abrasive lawyer, the film veers between crude and cuddly. Watch it for Reeves’ heartfelt reaction shots and Martin Scorsese’s small but perfectly played role.

Big Mood ★★★★ (Stan)

It’s a much-needed second series of this knockout British comedy, which showcases Derry Girls and Bridgerton star Nicola Coughlan as a young playwright, Maggie, whose personal and professional aspirations are shaped by her bipolar disorder. The bond between Maggie and her best friend, struggling bar owner Eddie (Lydia West), was eventually torn apart in the first season. The new episodes pick up as they reunite after a year’s silence, albeit with an unlikely third wheel present. Creator Camilla Whitehill continues to mix the very funny and the deeply perceptive.

Untold: Chess Mates ★★★½ (Netflix)

There has been a spate of chess documentaries recently, but this is the only one where anal beads (possibly) play a crucial role. Told with a raised eyebrow, the latest edition of the Untold sporting docs series recounts the 2022 scandal in which then-world champion Magnus Carlsen accused brash hopeful Hans Niemann of cheating in their tournament match, a controversy fuelled by theories that Niemann used a vibrating sex toy to prompt his successful moves. There’s no definitive answer, but this is an amusing study of elite competitors, complete with idiosyncratic supporting cast.

Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord ★★½ (Disney+)

The latest animated series from the Star Wars franchise puts a villain centre stage. First seen as a lightsabre-wielding adversary (played by Ray Park) in the 1999 prequel The Phantom Menace, who then featured in The Clone Wars (voiced by Sam Witwer), Darth Maul is a former Sith lord who has traded faith for vengeful criminal scheming. The stylised visual palette speaks to Maul’s tortured extremes, which is helpful because the writing doesn’t add a great deal to a character who has most often been a menacing adversary. It’s one for the dedicated fans.

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