Lena Dunham is synonymous with New York, having written, starred in and directed the hit HBO series Girls, which encapsulated millennial life through the misdemeanours of four young women living in the Big Apple.
But life had other plans for Lena, and everything changed in 2018 after she flew to the UK to work on a film adaptation of the Karen Cushman novel, Catherine, Called Birdy. She found herself rethinking her return to NYC after meeting fellow creative Luis Felber on a blind date arranged by a mutual friend.
“Birdy was interrupted by COVID. Filming for that actually commenced in 2021, and I thought, I’ll be here for the duration of the film, I’ll edit, and then I’ll skitter off to my life,” she told The New Yorker.
“And, about three weeks before we started, I met Luis. It became clear to me that he’s a person who set up a really beautiful creative life for himself. I was, like, I cannot drag him back to New York with me. I have to be here and engage in this life that he’s made.”
Lena is now happily ensconced in North London with Luis, who is now her husband. Lena says she’ll be eternally grateful to the friend who originally suggested they should go out on a date.
“Our friend Honor Titus, who’s an amazing painter, suggested it,” she recalls. “I was sitting there in quarantine purgatory, going, ‘I’m never going to meet a single person.’ And he just said, ‘My friend is a blast.’ And I believe he actually said, ‘You’re not going to marry him or anything, but you two should hang out.’” Cut to: I owe him my life.”