Adam Driver was ‘verbally aggressive’ and threw a chair, says Lena Dunham

Lena Dunham has shared new details about her working relationship with Adam Driver during the filming of Girls, describing several tense moments between the two actors in her memoir Famesick.

The HBO series, which aired from 2012 to 2017, followed Dunham’s character Hannah Horvath and her complicated relationship with Driver’s character Adam. Their on screen dynamic was often volatile, and Dunham writes that the intensity of those scenes sometimes carried into their work behind the camera.

In the memoir, Dunham recalls filming one of their earliest intimate scenes during the show’s first season. She writes that the blocking planned for the sequence quickly changed once filming began, saying Driver physically moved her around the set while performing the scene.

Dunham describes being momentarily stunned by the sudden shift in how the moment unfolded. As both the star and creator of the series, she had approached the scene with careful planning and says the unexpected intensity left her briefly unsure of how to respond in the moment.

She also describes another confrontation during rehearsal when she struggled to recall lines she had written for the script. According to Dunham, Driver grew frustrated during the practice session and shouted at her while urging her to continue the scene.

In the book she writes that he shouted, “FUCKING SAY SOMETHING,” before throwing a chair toward a nearby wall. Dunham recalls him then shouting again, “WAKE THE FUCK UP. I’M SICK OF WATCHING YOU JUST STARE.”

Dunham writes that the chair struck the wall next to her rather than hitting her directly. She also notes that she did not report the incident at the time and instead continued rehearsing the scene.

Despite describing these moments as frightening, Dunham also portrays the relationship as creatively intense rather than purely hostile. She writes that the two actors rehearsed frequently together during the early seasons and often clashed during the creative process.

According to Dunham, Driver’s approach to acting involved complete immersion in scenes, which sometimes resulted in explosive reactions when rehearsals did not go as planned. She describes him in the memoir as “short tempered and verbally aggressive” at times, but also capable of being supportive and protective during difficult periods.

The memoir also recounts moments of personal support between the two during the years the show was filmed, suggesting their relationship was complicated and emotionally layered.

A representative for Driver had not publicly responded to the claims at the time the excerpts began circulating.

Famesick explores Dunham’s experiences creating and starring in Girls while navigating the pressures of running a television series in her early twenties, offering a detailed look at the dynamics that shaped the production.