Lena Dunham

Lena Dunham is an American writer, director, actor and producer whose work often draws on the awkwardness of young adulthood. Born in New York City in 1986, she grew up in an artistic family: her mother, Laurie Simmons, is a photographer, and her father, Carroll Dunham, is a painter. She graduated from Oberlin College in 2008 and began making short films while still a student.

Her 2010 film *Tiny Furniture* brought her national attention. Dunham wrote, directed and starred in the independent feature as Aura, a recent college graduate who returns to her family’s New York apartment and struggles to decide what to do next. Simmons played Aura’s mother, and Dunham’s sibling appeared as her sister. The film won the narrative feature prize at the South by Southwest Film Festival and earned Dunham an Independent Spirit Award for its screenplay.

Dunham went on to create HBO’s *Girls*, which ran for six seasons from 2012 to 2017. She played Hannah Horvath, an aspiring writer navigating work, friendship and relationships in New York City. The series also starred Allison Williams, Jemima Kirke and Zosia Mamet as Hannah’s friends. Dunham wrote and directed episodes as well as acting in them, giving the show a distinctive, often uncomfortable sense of humor. In 2013, *Girls* won the Golden Globe for best television series in the musical or comedy category, and Dunham won the corresponding acting award.

Her work outside television has included the 2014 essay collection *Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She’s “Learned.”* In 2015, she and *Girls* collaborator Jenni Konner launched *Lenny Letter*, an email newsletter that published writing on culture, politics and feminism until it closed in 2018. Dunham has also written publicly about living with endometriosis, including a 2018 *Vogue* essay about undergoing a hysterectomy.

In 2022, she released two films she wrote and directed. *Sharp Stick* follows Sarah Jo, a sheltered young woman exploring sex and relationships. *Catherine Called Birdy*, adapted from Karen Cushman’s novel, stars Bella Ramsey as a spirited teenager in medieval England whose father hopes to arrange a profitable marriage for her. Dunham later co-created the Netflix series *Too Much* with her husband, musician Luis Felber. The show, which premiered in 2025, follows an American woman rebuilding her life in London. Across these projects, Dunham has worked both from personal experience and from existing fiction, while continuing to write roles centered on women trying to define their own lives.