Olivia Munn’s baby naming mishap: ‘You should change it’

Olivia Munn has opened up about a baby naming mishap that led her own mum to tell her she “should change it”.

The actress opened up in a recent episode of Late Night with Seth Meyers revealing that her daughter’s name Mei June came about from a misunderstanding.

When Seth Meyers mentioned that Munn and her husband comedian John Mulaney named her “as a tribute” to her mother, Munn revealed, “Well, I thought I did”.

Watch the video above.

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It turns out a passing conversation with Munn’s mum – Dung Kim Schmid – influenced their daughter’s name but it didn’t turn out how they had hoped.

“So, my daughter’s name is Mei, with an accent over the ‘E,’ which is plum in Chinese. And we were thinking about what the middle name should be,” Munn explained.

“And one day we were driving, my mum just says out of nowhere, ‘You know, people call me June.'”

“My mom’s name is Dung, it’s spelled d-u-n-g,’ the actress clarified.

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Munn’s mum continued to explain that people called her ‘June’ and it’s the “Americanised name for ‘Dung’. 

Speaking to Meyers, Munn revealed that she was sceptical about the fact that people called her mum ‘June’ but Dung was adamant.

”I said, ‘People call you June?’ She goes, ‘Yeah everyone calls me June’,” Munn explained.

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Soon after the car ride, Munn’s husband Mulaney shared that June “would be such a pretty name and such a great way to honour [her] mother”. So he suggested, “Why don’t we name her Mei June?”

Munn agreed that it was a great idea and when the baby was born, they sent a text message to the family group chat announcing the arrival of their newborn daughter named Mei June Mulaney and revealing she was named after Munn’s mum.

But when Munn’s mum arrived at the hospital just an hour later, she didn’t seem pleased.

“She’s holding the baby, and I realised she didn’t say anything about the name yet. So I said, ‘Mum, what do you think about her name?’ She goes, ‘It’s OK,’ Munn revealed.

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Munn was confused that her mum didn’t like the name and was taken aback.

“I was so offended, I said, ‘Well you know my grandmother’s name is Estelle, I was thinking about naming her Mei Estelle – maybe I should do that’. And she goes, ‘You should change it’,” Munn said, stunning the audience.

Munn explained that her mum began “pitching out” different names for the baby over the next few weeks, leaving Munn and Mulaney confused.

Until one day, it hit her.

“So my mum loves to talk, she just talks, talks. One time she spoke to me for 30 minutes about how she doesn’t talk a lot,” Munn joked.

“I remember back to that day where she told us people called her June. And I remember that there was nothing being said in the car. It was just silence, and then she just came up with this June thing,” Munn continued.

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Munn decided to confront her mum about it asking, “Did you just want to talk that day so you came up with this story that people call you June but no one has ever called you June?”

But her mum flatly denied it, saying, “Yes, people call me June.” When Munn asked when she had ever been called June, she said, “In 1987, two women called me June”.

Despite the mishap, Munn says she and her husband decided to keep the name.

“I was like, ‘You know what, it’s staying June, we’re not changing it!’,” Munn said.

“So yeah, she’s kind of in honour of my mother but I hope she doesn’t grow up to be as big a liar,” she joked.

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