Maude Apatow on Tennis, Theater, And Always Celebrating with Champagne

In an alternate reality, Maude Apatow might be practicing her serve instead of learning lines for the third season of Euphoria. “My dad was a ball boy growing up. He was really into tennis,” she said of her father, director Judd Apatow. “I think he wanted my sister and I to play tennis when we were younger. It never really stuck.”

Although Judd didn’t exactly get his wish, a love of tennis certainly transferred to his eldest daughter. In an exclusive conversation with Vanity Fair, Apatow shared her appreciation for the sport in the Moët & Chandon box at Arthur Ashe Stadium on the first day of the US Open. “I haven’t been to the Open before,” she shared, excitedly. Her first trip to the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center saw 19-year-old rising star Learner Tien face off against one of the all-time greats, 38-year-old Novak Djokovic, who currently holds the all-time Grand Slam record with 24 wins. “Djokovic is playing, so that’s pretty cool,” she said.

Apatow has had a pretty cool year herself, with a memorable cameo as the well-meaning gentrifier Bethany in the hit comedy One of Them Days, starring Grammy-winner SZA and Keke Palmer. “I only worked a couple of days, but it was so fun,” Apatow said. “Keke is a comic genius. She can improvise better than anyone I have ever seen in my entire life.”

While Lerner and Djokovic rallied back and forth, Apatow was joined by a slew of up-and-coming stars. Ben Ahlers, star of The Gilded Age who is sometimes affectionately known as “Clock Twink,” sat arm in arm with his girlfriend, Tony nominee and Grotesquerie star Michaela Diamond. Together, they chatted with Duster actor Rachel Hilson about the match and their upcoming projects. Next to them, influencer Tinx was caught on camera mouthing “That sucks” after Djokovic lost a nail-biter of a point against his 19-year old opponent—which she immediately posted to her Instagram story. Wunderkind chef and tennis aficionado Flynn McGarry was locked into the match despite the fact that his second restaurant, Cove, is set to open this week in the West Village.

Their box was conspicuously devoid of Honey Deuces—the Open’s signature pink vodka cocktail with honeydew melons shaped like tennis balls. Apatow and her compatriots chose to sip on complimentary Moët Champagne instead. “[I] love to celebrate with Champagne,” Apatow said. “It’s really special to break out Champagne at the end of something.”

Apatow enjoyed her bubbly as a well-deserved night out amidst filming the highly anticipated and highly under wraps third season of HBO’s Euphoria from director Sam Levinson. “We’ve been shooting since the end of January, and we’re getting close to finishing,” Apatow says. “It’s been really nice to see everyone together. It’s been years since we shot the last season.” Those years that have passed since the second season of Euphoria, which aired in 2022, are reflected in the script, which makes a bold leap into the future.

“It’s five years in the future. We’re all navigating our adult lives,” Apatow says of season three. While she’s not at liberty to release details as to what is in store for her character, aspiring playwright Lexi Howard, Apatow can say that she thinks Levinson made “the right call” by allowing the characters to age out of high school. “I like that it’s growing up with us,” she says. “From what I’ve seen and read so far, I think people will really like it.”

A highlight of diving back into Euphoria has been reuniting with her castmates, including Jacob Elordi, Sydney Sweeney, Hunter Schafer, and Challengers star Zendaya. “We’ve all known each other for eight years,” she says. “We grew up together. We love each other.” Apatow recently enjoyed a karaoke night with Elordi, Sweeney, and Schafer, causing a bit of a tabloid storm in the process. “My song is ‘What’s Up?’ by 4 Non Blondes,” Apatow says. Well, it’s not her only karaoke song. “I have a lot of songs because I love karaoke,” she says. “And ‘You Oughta Know’ by Alanis Morissette.”

Apatow hasn’t only been belting into a karaoke mic: She’s been busting out her pipes onstage, starring as Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors off-Broadway, and Sally Bowles in Cabaret in the West End in 2023. “I grew up doing musical theater. I’m obsessed with theater. I went to Northwestern for theater and then I didn’t do anything there when I was there,” she said. The year she spent onstage was “the best year ever” and she can’t wait to get back on stage again. “I got so lucky that I was able to do it that year. It was the year of the strike. We weren’t shooting,” she says. “[In] theater, you have to dedicate so much time, and you can’t really do anything else.”

And Apatow has other things she’d like to do. Her directorial debut, Poetic License, premieres at Toronto International Film Festival next month. The film follows two college best friends who begin to compete for the attention of a middle-aged woman in their poetry seminar, and boasts an impressive cast that includes Nico Parker, Maisy Stella, Cooper Hoffman, Jake Bongiovi, Andrew Barth Feldman, and Apatow’s mom, Leslie Mann.

“It’s the most excited I’ve been in a long time,” she said of her directorial debut. “I love directing. It’s my life goal.”

That’s not to say she hasn’t thought of what a return to the stage might look like—although it might be a while. “Sally was my dream role, so I don’t know what else there is left unless I’m, like, an older woman,” Apatow said. She tossed out Mama Rose, the iconic Gypsy heroine and stage mom recently played by Audra McDonald as an option way down the line. When I suggested a mother-daughter Gypsy production starring Apatow and Mann in the more immediate future, Apatow pointed out one small problem on her mom’s end: “She’s tone-deaf,” she said with a laugh.

Out on the tennis court, after a competitive second set that ends in a tie break, Djokovic pulled away for a decisive victory. Apatow watched the match until the end with Moët, enjoying her first US Open—even if tennis wasn’t exactly her calling. “I would rather do karaoke than most things,” she admits. “But I love watching tennis.”