David Bianculli

She's in Margot, too, playing a lawyer with a colorful background.

But she's only one of many talented jewels in this show's crown.

Others include Kelly's wife, Michelle Pfeiffer, currently starring in The Madison, Nick Offerman from Parks and Recreation, Devs, and The Last of Us, and veteran stars Greg Kinnear and Marsha Gay Harden.

Appearing with all of them in the title role is Elle Fanning, who was so great as a comic Catherine the Great in the TV series called The Great.

Here, she plays Margot Millett, a promising first-year student at a California community college.

Her eventually odious literature professor praises her writing, has an affair with her, gets her pregnant, then ghosts her.

All within the show's opening episode.

Margot decides she wants to have the baby anyway, which upsets her mother Cheyenne, a flamboyant woman played by Michelle Pfeiffer.

The dad, played by Nick Offerman, eventually shows up on Margot's doorstep.

He's a former pro wrestler named Jinx, and his exploits inside the ring might sound like comic relief or a broad caricature.

But like Margot's mother and Margot herself, these characters have depth and darkness and can be serious as well as amusing.

When Jinks returns to reunite with Margo after hearing of her pregnancy, he confesses that he's come straight from rehab after years of drug abuse.

The money troubles in the title mount up for Margot after her baby is born.

And her unusual solution for paying the bills is to open an OnlyFans account.

Some of the offerings and interactions on that site can be quite sexual and quite lucrative.

Margot keeps it PG-rated, first by writing playful prose, then by appearing in still photos, and finally by producing and starring in saucy sci-fi-themed videos.

Her goal is to keep her source of income secret and completely apart from her private life.

But that goal fails.

And because Margot's Got Money Troubles is as realistic as it is fanciful, the ramifications of her actions are real and sometimes painful.

She experiences shaming, regret, even legal troubles.