Olivia Munn returns to TV as a mom 'in the middle of a breakdown.' It's made her 'much more aware' as a parent.

Yahoo

12-04-2025

Who doesn't love some good gossip? Even Olivia Munn can't resist a salacious story about a neighborhood scandal.
Munn stars in Apple TV+'s new dark comedyYour Friends & Neighbors. On its surface the series is about a group of rich people behaving badly, but you can't help but root for some of the characters. (Think Desperate Housewives meets Breaking Bad.) It's the actress's first onscreen role in more than three years, and she told Yahoo Entertainment her "fascination with human nature" made it too juicy an opportunity to pass up.
"What happens when everything that you value is just stripped away? The idea that blind ambition can completely upend the idea of privilege, wealth and social status ... I really enjoy — even in real life — I love hearing stories about people behaving badly," she said.
Your Friends and Neighbors, which starts streaming Friday, is about disgraced hedge fund manager Andrew Cooper (Jon Hamm), who starts robbing his wealthy neighbors after he's fired. Munn plays Samantha Levitt, a divorcée secretly sleeping with Cooper as their worlds fall apart.
For Munn, she finds "the parts of people that they don't want to admit" very "fascinating."
"I love this character because she's a really ambitious mother who cares about her children, but she also married for money. That's very obvious, and she made that choice," Munn said. "Years later her marriage is imploding and she's watching her life crumble, and if she had made a different choice in her life, she may not be in this situation."
Munn continued: "Because she made that choice with that motive [to marry rich], it was always going to collapse. I really love the idea of playing someone who is in the middle of a breakdown and trying to keep up the facade."
Although Munn can't necessarily relate on the marital discord front — she is happily married to John Mulaney — Sam's instinct to protect her kids is one attribute she has in common with her character. This is her first time playing a mother since becoming one herself; she has a son, Malcolm, 3, and a daughter Mei, 6 months, with the the host of Everybody's Live With John Mulaney. While Munn "always understood loving" and caring for others, playing a mom now hits differently.
"I see how vulnerable your children are and how much they need you to operate in the world and how all of your decisions shape who they are. Even the most inconsequential decision to you could be monumental for them," she said. "I say to John a lot, 'We don't know when [Malcolm's] going to have a core memory.'"
Munn continued: "There are things that happened to me in my life, or something that my mom had said offhand that she probably doesn't even remember but became a core memory for me. ... I'm much more aware of these moments in children's lives and having to really kind of pull back and be reserved in certain moments because kids are always watching."
The first two episodes of start streaming April 11 on Apple TV+.