James Marsden’s 50th birthday party in 2023 was a reason to eat, drink and be married. Olivia Munn explains how John Mulaney’s proposal went down.
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James Marsden’s 50th birthday party was a reason to eat, drink and be married for Olivia Munn.
Munn, who welcomes Marsden and the “electric energy” he brings to Season 2 of “Your Friends & Neighbors,” debuting April 3 (Fridays, Apple TV+), says her longtime friend played an important role in her 2023 engagement to comedian John Mulaney. The couple tied the knot in the summer 2024 and share two children, Malcolm Hiệp, 4, and Méi June Mulaney, 18 months.
Growing up in Oklahoma, Munn was friends with Marsden’s younger sister.
In high school, “he took me and his little sister out for dinner and ice cream one night, and it was really sweet,” Munn recalls.
Marsden provided proof for Munn that an aspirational actor from the Sooner State could make it in La La Land. And the night of Marsden’s 50th blowout at Los Angeles’ historic Sheats–Goldstein Residence in September 2023 proved to be another pivotal part in Munn’s story.
“I had just gone through a lot of surgeries for breast cancer, and I wasn’t really feeling like myself,” Munn says. “And I was like, ‘You know what? Let’s go to James’ birthday, and it’ll give me an opportunity to get dressed up and do glam and just see how I feel.’ ”
The evening of Marsden’s bash proved “so serendipitous,” Munn says, “because John was like, ‘You know, this is the best time to propose to Olivia.’ My husband was like, ‘She’s going to be all dressed up, she’s going to feel really great.’ ”
So good in fact that Munn, typically the guest who likes to leave early, uncharacteristically partied late into the night.
“John kept saying, ‘Are you ready to go?’ Because I would normally say yes,” Munn says. But she urged him to stay. “He was like, ‘OK.’ And then he asked me three times and he was like, ‘This is strange. Are you sure you don’t want to go?’ I’m like, ‘No, I’m good.’”
Finally back at the hotel, Munn says she had no idea Mulaney would pop the question imminently.
“I had even ignored all the flowers that were there. I wasn’t picking up on any cues,” she says. “And then he asked me to go outside, and he starts giving the proposal speech. And I’m like, ‘Wait, what’s happening?’ I’m like, ‘Are you proposing?’ And he was like, ‘Yes.’
“And then I started dying laughing, because I was like, ‘Wait, it’s 1 a.m. What would you have done if I just kept saying, ‘I want to stay out longer’? And he was like, ‘I just would’ve waited and proposed to you whenever.’ … It was such a great night and then it became an even better night for me.”
