For most of the past decade, Lena Dunham has been offline: no Instagram, no scrolling, with a trusted collaborator managing her digital presence. Last year, she and that collaborator—strategist Dolly Meckler—decided to make an exception, and Lena got her Substack login. “It was like when I graduated from rehab,” Lena told us. “Very adult.”
Since then, Lena’s become increasingly active on Good Thing Going, writing about everything from reading lists to her favorite Etsy finds to how she organizes her Notes app. Now she’s promoting her new memoir, Famesick, from bed, both at home and onstage, where she’s been hosting a kind of roving variety show from under the covers—and all over Substack.
In the days leading up to the memoir’s release, Lena made guest appearances on publications across the platform, an online book tour that let her collaborate with some of her favorite writers. Each piece was written to fit its home: a ’90s fashion nostalgia trip for Emilia Petrarca, a Q&A on body image and rehab for Health Gossip, a meditation on moviegoing for 11am Saturday. Writer Casey Lewis of After School took note: “I can’t recall a single book launch that has utilized the Substack platform so handily.”
We talked with Lena and Dolly about “going where it’s warm,” why they promoted Famesick sideways rather than head-on, and what Dolly would do differently next time.
You’ve been in bed with everyone from the NYT to Emily Sundberg in the last few weeks. How’s the press tour going?
Lena: It’s been a ball! Last time I really did this level of public anything was the last season of Girls (and if you read Famesick you’ll see that I wasn’t really in the place to, uh, enjoy it). Since then I’ve been largely behind the scenes as a writer and director, which means you can rely on your cast to hold it down, press-wise. I have definitely pushed myself out of the little comfort zone I’ve found in recent years, but that’s because, as all the many authors of Substack know, when it comes to a book, there’s only you. So I realized I was going to have to find a way to do promotion and a tour that didn’t leave me physically and spiritually fracked.
 | | Lena Dunham 6d Boston was a ball- was lucky enough to have the smarty sweetie @Emily Sundberg in bed with me. This picture is giving “it’s 1967 and we just started in the typing pool at Madamoiselle magazine” 👠💄👩✈️ | |  | | |
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