Lena Dunham has recently released her new memoir, Famesick. In the book, she chronicles the struggles she faced while creating and working on her debut HBO show, Girls. While detailing her experience on the show, Dunham also recounts her complicated dynamic with co-star Adam Driver.
Lena Dunham and Adam Driver shared a tumultuous off-screen chemistry
In the show, Lena Dunham played Hannah Horvath, an aspiring writer who is figuring out relationships and adulthood in New York City, while Adam Driver played Adam Sackler, her on-and-off boyfriend. Their relationship is one of the defining arcs of the show, and can be described as an emotional rollercoaster. It seems that Driver, intending to fully immerse himself in the role, tried to create an atmosphere during their off-screen rehearsals that aligned with the show’s creative direction.
In that context, Dunham explained that Driver would sometimes be intense and aggressive during rehearsals for the show. In one instance, she alleged that the actor “hurled a chair at the wall” next to her when she forgot her lines. Furthermore, she claimed that Driver screamed, “F—– SAY SOMETHING… WAKE THE F—- UP. I’M SICK OF WATCHING YOU JUST STARE.”
The incident shook her to such an extent that she recalled saying her lines correctly afterward.
She explained that she justified the Marriage Story star’s erratic behaviour in her mind by chalking it up to being proportionate to the creative direction of the show. “I reasoned that the intensity of his anger at me, anger that could make him spit and throw things, was proportionate to the intensity of our creative connection,” she wrote in her memoir.
Furthermore, she recalled another incident in which she apologized to Adam Driver for a “perceived slight” she “couldn’t remember committing” in his dressing room. The actress stated that Driver responded in a chilling manner.
“He got close to my face and hissed, ‘Never forget that I know you. I really f—— know you,’” she stated in her book. When she challenged him, “What do you know?” he supposedly replied, “You don’t go to parties. You love animals. And you hate being whispered about.”
Dunham noted that his observations were accurate, which made it quite an intense moment. She also mentioned in her book that although Driver was “verbally aggressive,” he could also be “loving,” recalling that he would come to her apartment to give her company when she felt anxious while working on the show.
She further wrote that she “spent an inordinate amount of time wondering” if Driver liked her, but that notion faded when he informed her that he was engaged.
The memoir also suggests that Dunham remained conscious of maintaining professional boundaries despite the emotional intensity of their dynamic.
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