Lena Dunham hosts slumber party at Lyman

The John Lyman Center became the host of a teenage sleepover as Lena Dunham, a writer and director, took the stage on Saturday, May 1, for an evening of storytelling, conversation and shared reflection.

Attendees arrived in pajamas and settled into the theater like it was a shared bedroom while Dunham hopped into bed and dove into her latest book, “Famesick: A Memoir.”

“The whole vibe of this event is that I wanted to sort of recreate where I’ve spent the majority in the last 12 years, which is in my bedroom,” Dunham said. “So, I thought we could invite you in.”

The event, FAMESICK: An Evening of Stories and Togetherness, marked Dunham’s return to the stage in celebration of her first book in over a decade.

The work revisits her early fame with the hit TV series, “Girls,” while also tracing her experiences with chronic illness, including endometriosis and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.

To set the stage as a slumber party, Dunham introduced Naomi Fry, staff writer at The New Yorker and co-host of the magazine’s podcast, Critics at Large, who served as both a moderator and companion.

Dunham began by taking attendees back to where she first picked up the pen to write her latest memoir: fresh out of rehab.

“I started the book when I had just gotten out of rehab. And for anyone who’s been, it is wild. It’s like summer camp for deeply traumatized adults,” Dunham said.

“You come back, and you’re like, I have so many stories, and if I share them, you’re not going to want to be friends with me anymore.”

Dunham said she found herself resorting to writing her experience out on paper.

“And so, I thought to slam out a book about getting sober, and off we go,” Dunham said. “But then the book really became my companion for about eight years, and there’s thousands of pages that no one will or should ever see.”

Dunham said that writing out her trauma and challenges became a cathartic outlet.

“What was interesting was that actually writing the stuff that we considered traumatic was sort of a joy. There’s something about writing the scene again. It’s almost like watching a horror movie for the second time, and you know what’s going to happen,” Dunham said.

Dunham also embraced her own shame by admitting that writing the memoir often came with a visible physical reaction.

“I felt a lot of shame. My husband actually said — I would write a lot at night — and he would look over, and in the glow of the computer see my face contorted into this horrible expression,” Dunham said.

She then shifted into a reflective conversation by encouraging the audience to extend grace toward their past selves.

“I think many people’s entire 20s are a story about shame, and there is something extremely, dare I say, healing about going back and having some empathy for that version of yourself,” Dunham said.

Dunham continued weaving through stories of love, addiction and life after fame while adding hints of blunt honesty and sarcasm that kept attendees in the slumber party spirit.

Dunham also invited audience members onstage to play reimagined versions of classic sleepover staples, including “rose, bud, thorn” and a spin on “kiss, marry, kill.”

Before closing the event, Dunham held a Q&A session where she answered recorded voice memos from the audience before leading a meditation session.

Audience members were able to slow down and sit with themselves for a minute.

The tone of the evening matched the end of a sleepover, when guests are not ready to leave yet.

“Just go live your sweet one and only life,” Dunham said.