Lena Dunham Says Hollywood Is 'Rigged In Favor Of White People' While Examining Her Privilege

Breaking into the film and TV industry isn’t always easy, but for Lena Dunham it really was no sweat.

Though she first made a name for herself with the semi-autobiographic feature film Tiny Furniture in 2010, it was the series Girls which really put her on the map, and Dunham recently explored how privilege played a role in her ability to break into the industry “with relative ease.”

The 34-year-old took to Twitter on Sunday and wrote:

“Whenever I find out I’m trending, I have to immediately check if I’m alive! Then, I try and see if there’s a constructive dialogue to have on Twitter. Often there isn’t, but today there really WAS. (Thread)”

She explained (below) how the system in Hollywood is “rigged in favor of white people,” and acknowledged her privilege as a white woman being the reason it was easy for her to make a name for herself at a young age:

“It actually wasn’t a dialogue – it was just me agreeing that the Hollywood system is rigged in favor of white people and that my career took off at a young age with relative ease, ease I wasn’t able to recognize because I also didn’t know what privilege was.”

Dunham concluded:

“The past ten years have been a series of lessons. The lesson now? Sit down. Shut up, unless it’s to advocate for change for Black people. Listen. Make art in private for awhile- no one needs your book right now lady. Give reparations widely. Defund the police. Rinse & repeat.”

Her thread came after a 2017 interview with the Hollywood Reporter resurfaced, in which she discussed her lack of preparation for the first pitch meeting with HBO to discuss Girls, which ran from 2012 until 2017. The informal pitch, described by Dunham as “a tone poem about millennial life,” was just a page and a half long, titled “Lena,” and drew comparisons to iconic NYC-set television series Sex and the City and Gossip Girl.

Revealing that she had yet to develop an overall plot for the show or even a character, the Golden Globe Award winner explained to the outlet at the time:

“I mean, it is the worst pitch you’ve ever read. It was like, ‘They’re everything, they’re nothing, they’re everywhere, they’re nowhere.’ It’s pretentious and horrifying, but I remember sitting on the floor, listening to Tegan and Sara in my underwear, being like, ‘I’m a genius.'”

Thoughts on anything Lena shared, Perezcious readers?? Let us know (below) in the comments!!

[Image via WENN/Instar.]