Exclusive Interview
‘Nobody Wants This’: Justine Lupe Weighs In on Morgan & Sasha’s Future After Season 2
What To Know
- Justine Lupe, who plays Morgan in Nobody Wants This, describes the evolving relationship between her character and Sasha in Season 2.
- Lupe said she’s open various possibilities for her character’s romantic future in Season 3 and gives her take on how Morgan and Sasha should move forward.
- Morgan broke off her engagement with Dr. Andy at the end of Season 2.
[Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for Nobody Wants This Season 2.]
Nobody Wants This may be focused on Noah (Adam Brody) and Joanne’s (Kristen Bell) turbulent romance, but its supporting characters don’t fade away into the background. Their respective siblings, Sasha (Timothy Simons) and Morgan (Justine Lupe), get even more time to shine in Season 2, and their complicated relationship evolves.
In Season 1, the self-proclaimed “loser siblings” found a kinship with each other, toeing the line between platonic and romantic. It irked Sasha’s wife (Jackie Tohn), so at the beginning of Season 2, Esther wastes no time in sitting the duo down and putting an end to it. While Morgan and Sasha’s interactions become more limited in the Netflix show’s latest outing, they still support each other — especially towards the end of the season. Morgan ends her whirlwind relationship with her therapist at their engagement party, while Esther tells Sasha that she needs some time apart from him.
When Swooon caught up with Lupe just hours ahead of Nobody Wants This’ Season 3 renewal, she reflected on Morgan and Sasha’s dynamic in Season 2 and Morgan’s romantic future. While the actress has no “secret hopes” for her character — she trusts the writers and enjoys not knowing what’s coming — Lupe does have a stance on whether or not Morgan and Sasha should get together in Season 3 from a viewer’s perspective.
“I feel more clear about what Sasha feels like, what he needs [compared to Morgan],” she said. “It’s a big thing to leave a relationship, or to be separated, or have some sort of an ending, new iteration of a dynamic with your wife and the mother of your child. I hope that he explores and enjoys his life, but maybe doesn’t rush into something with someone a little bit. I feel a little more worried about him and what he’s going through than I do about Morgan.”
As they sit together during Episode 10’s catastrophic party, Sasha tells Morgan that he plans on waiting for Esther to figure things out. “I feel like Sasha was sensitive to Esther’s needs and responded with care about his wife and what she was going through,” Lupe explained. “And I think that Morgan, at the end of the season, I think she really sees what he’s going through. And so there’s an honoring of boundaries this season between them.”
Erin Simkin / Netflix
The actress added that the “platonic intimacy” is still there in that moment, and they’ve figured out how to lean on each other without crossing boundaries, which is something she enjoyed about their evolving dynamic. “They found that they are past the kind of flirty negging, and they’ve been called out on it being hurtful, and so they re-navigate how to have a friendship in a way that feels respectful of the context of their relationship,” she said.
Why are Morgan and Sasha able to open up to each other in a way that they don’t really with anybody else? Lupe thinks that in addition to seeing themselves in one another, their “childlike banter” puts them in a sort of play zone. “I think that with that kind of sense of play, there’s just inherent trust, and I think that they really are drawn to each other and enjoy each other,” she said. “So I think, with the culmination of those things, it just creates an environment for maybe a certain level of intimacy.”
Lupe thinks that in Season 1, Morgan never reached the “crush” stage when it came to Sasha, though there was “a little bit of an attraction” shared between them. “It’s unclear what that attraction was,” she noted. “I think that’s what they found, something that was a little bit like, ‘Oh, I see you, and there’s something sparkly about you, and I’m drawn to you, and I’m not quite sure what that is.’”
If Morgan and Sasha were to get together in Season 3, though, Lupe thinks that seeing each other for who they are would help them grow together. Lupe compared it to Morgan’s failed relationship with Dr. Andy: They were attracted to a projection of each other rather than their true selves.
“[Morgan and Sasha] are more flawed; they’ve gotten to this level of intimacy where they can poke fun at each other, and they can tease each other, and they can call each other out on things. There’s a certain level of comfort in all the different dimensions of each other,” she explained. “I think that that’s something that’s really valuable in a relationship, and healing in a relationship, to be with someone who sees all of you and is interested in being with you.”
She added, “I don’t know if Morgan’s had that before, so I don’t know. If this goes that way… I feel a little bit tricky even answering.”
Lupe knows people who’ve found the loves of their lives after breakups and others who worked on themselves before finding something new. She doesn’t believe in rules when it comes to love. With that in mind, she’s open to Morgan staying single in Season 3 or beginning a new relationship. If the show goes the latter route, she thinks someone with a “specific personality” like Morgan needs someone who “supports who she is and sees who she is really clearly.” Ideally, they would also be on a similar wavelength, loyal to their family, and maybe a little bit more evenly tempered than she is.
“She could meet someone who she does the work with them,” Lupe said. “I think a lot of work happens in relationships, no matter what kind of individual work that you do outside of being in a relationship like… So I don’t know. I feel like she could use some time off to just breathe, be with herself, and do some self-care. But I also am like, well, if she met the right guy, like, go for it. Have fun.”
Nobody Wants This, Season 2, Streaming Now, Netflix
