Lena Dunham: I'm careful with sex scenes in Girls

Lena Dunham says there is a fine line when filming sex scenes between being ‘comfortable’ and feeling ‘violated’.

The multi-talented 27-year-old writer, director and star of TV’s Girls has been near-universally praised for her boldly honest approach to sex scenes in the show but says she is always considerate of her male co-stars whenever they strip off for an intimate moment.

‘It’s really important in a sex scene to know each person’s limits, if they’re going to be comfortable if you improvise slapping their ass, or if it’s going to make them feel really weird and violated,’ she told a packed London audience as the show made its third season UK premiere on Wednesday.

While the show has won fans around the world for showing the struggles of four twenty-something women living and working in modern day New York, it seems some have found issue with Dunham’s approach to showing realistic sex scenes – and with her herself.

‘A lot of people like to tell me they hated the show, and me, when they first saw the show,’ she said.

She also expressed her slightly masochistic approach to keeping up with the response from viewers, explaining: ‘I read all the tweets and I don’t know if it’s a good idea, but I can’t stop the joy and the pain.’

Dunham also took the opportunity to play down recent reports that Victoria Beckham is being lined up to guest star on the show.

‘We would be very excited to welcome Victoria Beckham on to our set, but this is an arranged marriage made by the Daily Mail,’ she said, adding she thought 39-year-old Posh would be too ‘chic’ to appear on the show.

This week the New York born star made her debut on the cover of American Vogue where she again addressed her bold approach to sex scenes in her show.

‘Seeing somebody who looks like you having sex on television is a less comfortable experience than seeing somebody who looks like nobody you’ve ever met,’ she told the magazine, emphasising the fact that she has become something of a figure-head for ‘real sized’ women in today’s celebrity obsessed culture.

However her appearance on the magazine cover has sparked controversy with many criticising the use of airbrushing on the star and observing the decision to provide a close up of Dunham’s face as the cover shot as opposed to her full body.

[Originally published Metro, Guilty Pleasures, Friday 17 January 2014]