Lena Dunham

Lena Dunham began making independent short films while attending Oberlin College, including Pressure (2006), Open the Door (2007), Hooker on Campus (2007), and The Fountain (2007). She also created the web series Tight Shots (2007) and Delusional Downtown Divas (2009), and premiered her feature Creative Nonfiction (2009) at South by Southwest.

Dunham's breakthrough came with her semi-autobiographical feature Tiny Furniture (2010), which she wrote, directed, and starred in. The film won the South by Southwest Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature and earned her the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay. Its success led to a development deal with HBO.

She created, wrote, directed, executive produced, and starred in the HBO series Girls (2012–2017), which ran for six seasons and earned her multiple Emmy nominations, two Golden Globe Awards, and the Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Comedy Series (2013). During this period, she also hosted Saturday Night Live (2014), published the bestselling essay collection Not That Kind of Girl (2014), founded the production company A Casual Romance Productions (2015), guest starred on Scandal (2015), appeared in My Art (2016), voiced a role in My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea (2016), and portrayed Valerie Solanas in American Horror Story: Cult (2017).

Following Girls, Dunham co-created, wrote, and executive produced the HBO series Camping (2018). She appeared in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), co-founded the podcast The C-Word Podcast (2019), and launched the production company Good Thing Going (2019). She directed and executive produced the premiere episode of HBO's Industry (2020), appeared in The Stand In (2020) and Music (2021), and executive produced the HBO Max series Generation (2021).

In 2022, Dunham wrote, directed, produced, and appeared in Sharp Stick, and wrote, directed, and produced Catherine Called Birdy. She co-created, wrote, directed, produced, and executive produced the Netflix series Too Much (2025), which she created with Luis Felber. She published her second memoir, Famesick (2026), and moderated the launch event for Jennette McCurdy's novel Half His Age (2026).