Lena Dunham born in New York City
Lena Dunham is born in New York City to artist parents Carroll Dunham, painter, and Laurie Simmons, photographer and painter. She has one sister, Grace. She attends St. Ann School in Brooklyn, and divides her time between New York and her family’s home in Salisbury, Connecticut. Dunham writes about her life at age eight:
My name is Lena Dunham. I am eight almost nine. I was born May 13 1986. My grate grandmother who I never met was named Lena. My papa is namd Carroll dunham. My mama is Laurie Simmons.
Creative Nonfiction
0 CommentsDunham makes a low-budget, low-fi sixty minute film about Ella, a college student (played by Dunham) who has ambivalent feelings about her dorm-mate Chris. Ella is a virgin, and the film wrestles with her anxieties about sex as she tries unsuccessfully to complete a screenplay she has to finish in order to graduate. The film premiered at the New Filmmakers festival and was included in Austin’s South by Southwest festival.
A lot of it. An embarrassingly amount of it is autobiographical . . . . On a film-making level you can do it. An incredibly low- budget, low-fi way of working. If I can make a movie, really, anyone can make a movie.
Tiny Furniture
0 CommentsIn the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas, Dunham screens her feature length film Tiny Furniture. Dunham wrote and directed the film, which tells the story of a young woman freshly graduated from college trying to find her next step while living in her parents apartment in TriBeca. The film wins the festival’s best feature film award. On her character’s low self-esteem:
It’s trite to say, but when you’re not sure about who you are, or what you’re worth, or what your purpose is, there’s a way that you’ll let people who you think have a clearer sense of those things [into your life] and be thankful for any attention those people will give you.
Girls
0 CommentsDunham’s cable television series Girls debuts on HBO. The series purports to chronicle the lives of four twenty-something single women living in New York. The show, produced by Judd Appatow, features Allison Williams, Jemima Kirke, Adam Driver, Zosia Mamet, Alex Karpovsky. Dunham conceived of the show, and is its principal creator, as well as starring in the leading role of Hannah Horvath. On personal experiences the show reflects:
I am a working woman out in the world, but I still live with my parents half the time. I’ve been taking this long, stuttering period of moving out. … I feel like I’m constantly asking them to please stay out of my work life, but also to please bring me soup. It’s this weird moment where you just don’t have a sense of what age-appropriate behavior is because there is no age-appropriate behavior.
Emmy nomination
Dunham is nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy for the 64th Emmy Awards for portraying Hannah Horvath on Girls.
I have had the shriekiest morning of my life. I literally feel like I got asked to the prom and engaged and told I was going to the moon all in one day. Not to be too dramatic.
Signs Book Deal
Dunham signs a more than $3.5 million book deal. After submitting a glossy 66 page proposal to publishers for her collection of personal essays entitled Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She’s Learned, Random House signs Dunham on for the project, buying both American and Canadian book rights. According to the publisher, the book is slated to cover love, friendship, and “frank and funny advice on everything from sex to eating to traveling to work.”
(I am) thrilled to be working with and learning from the brilliant minds at Random House, and to be among their incredible roster of authors. I look forward to digging deep with Andy and co. (book editor) to produce the most thoughtful and personal book I can.
Develops Pilot
Dunham and Jenni Konner plan to develop a comedy series on HBO based on the life of personal shopper Betty Halbreich. The duo have been tasked to write the pilot for the show. HBO has not officially announced the show but it has confirmed that Dunham and Konner will work to adapt Halbreich’s memoir All Dressed Up and Everywhere to Go. Halbreich made a name for herself working as a career shopper at Bergdorf Goodman, buying clothes for rich Manhattanites. Halbreich:
We’re holding on, until the (my) book comes out. And she has a book coming out right after me! I will tell you something: I adore her as a human being. We are, if nothing comes of this, we’re very attached at the hip.
Emmy nomination
Dunham is nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy at the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards for portraying Hannah Horvath on Girls.
This is amazing. It’s a very exciting boost to go to set with something to celebrate beyond just the fact that the breakfast truck serves quesadillas.
Marie Claire cover
Dunham appears on the cover of the October 2013 issue of Marie Claire. She talks about her parents and how she learned to love her body.
My parents both have really healthy attitudes about their own bodies but also about the range of things that can be beautiful. But they also just always made me feel pretty and cool and smart, even in the moments when I have known — and still know — that my body wasn’t fitting into a traditional Hollywood idea of the female body.
Vogue cover
Dunham appears on the cover of the February issue of Vogue. Beside her photo it reads:
Hey, girl. Lena Dunham: The New Queen of Comedy
Lena Dunham interview
Seacrest interviews Dunham during On Air With Ryan Seacrest and questions her about why she wants to quite acting after the series Girls is over.
I don’t know if I’m going to want to act anymore. I’m always relieved on the days I don’t have to. I’d rather give parts to other women than be the woman having the parts.
Glamour cover
Dunham appears on the cover of the April 2014 issue of Glamour magazine. The cover photo ia taken by Tom Munro and styled by Katie Mossman. Dunham talks about her future acting career.
I don’t know if I’m going to want to act anymore. I’m always relieved on the days I don’t have to. I’d rather give parts to other women than be the woman having the parts.
Alleges rapist hurt other women
0 CommentsDunham says she learned that her alleged rapist, who she refers to as Barry, hurt at least two other women:
The next semester [following her alleged rape], after Barry is gone, my friend Melody tells me that once her friend Julia woke up the morning after sex with Barry, and the wall was spattered with blood. Spattered, she said, ‘like a crime scene.’ But he was nice, and he took her for the morning after pill and named the baby they weren’t having.
She adds another anecdote about the person:
There was a story about him punching a girl in the boobs at a party.
Emmy nomination
Dunham is nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy at the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards for portraying Hannah Horvath on Girls.
It’s an honor to be recognized with this incredible group of fierce and funny women. This list of nominees would also be the list for the best dinner party in history. Many thanks to the academy and to HBO.
‘Jaw-dropping, terrifying, essential’
Dunham reacts to the death of Rivers:
Watching Joan Rivers do standup at age 81 was incredible: athletic, jaw-dropping, terrifying, essential. It never stopped. Neither will she.
Lena Dunham interview
Lena talks about being hungry at the Emmys and she explains what it’s like to bring her parents there with her.
It’s an amazing honor to be nominated, it’s a long night.
Lena Dunham interview
Dunham talks about writing for Archie comics and reveals that she’s a lifelong Archie fan on Jimmy Kimmel Live.
I’m pretty excited, it is one of those child hood dreams.
The value system is off from my own, I think it could use a feminist.
Lena Dunham interview
Dunham gives an interview on Jimmy Kimmel Live and discusses her high school reunion.
I am avoiding who I was.
The New York Times cover
Dunham appears on the cover of the culture issue of The New York Times magazine. She talks about her book being leaked, her boyfriend, and big career moments.
I think there’s a part of my parents and a part of me that is consistently excited and surprised that I am in any way functional. I’ve had a lot of moments in my career where I’ve had to just say, ‘I’m picking my jaw up off the floor and carrying on,’ Because you don’t get much work done with your jaw on the floor.
Book Tour
0 CommentsDunham begins at Barnes & Noble’s Union Square location in New York. part of her 11-city tour promoting her collection of personal essays Not That Kind of Girl. Dunham chose seven performers to act as “warm-up” for her tour, which includes live music and food trucks. Tickets to the scheduled events cost $38 and include a sign copied of Dunham’s book. The tour will feature appearances by the actor Carrie Brownstein, and novelist Zadie Smith. Her publishers want to rebrand Dunham as a writer, according to Theresa Zoro, director of publicity at Random House:
We’re trying to establish her as a writer, a very serious literary writer, so we put her in conversation with authors who are very literary.