okay so lena dunham’s monologue in girls season 5 episode 10 (i.e. the one when she tells her story at the moth) gave me more respect for her than i’ve ever, ever had in the past. i am honestly going to transcribe that whole thing below, because even though the transcription does no justice to the brilliant acting that went with it, i need some permanent reminder to myself to go back and watch that a few more times in my life every now and then, and this post is that reminder. i used to watch this show while ironing in my little east village abode and thought it was meh – an exaggerated - and even a little reductive? - stereotyping of 20-somethings-in-new-york whose experiences were just so borderline ludicrous that i was dissuaded from watching it except while ironing for a very long time. but season 5 has really pulled through with some much more tangible, real characters and some rad acting/tough scenes, and i am JUST SO IMPRESSED. maybe i just really miss housing works (where it was shot), or i’m just really tired, because it’s midnight and i’ve been sleep deprived in a desert, but it is what it is, and i just had to have a good gush. it was soooooo good to see hannah speaking profoundly and eloquently, and lena dunham acting that layered person so well, when i think a lot of the show she’s bumbling around and self-bashing in a trying-too-hard-to-be-relatable way. so here’s the pivotal moment of my renewed appreciation for girls typed out (bc i couldn’t find a video version - tragic bc i was all about that slow zoom à la that scene in shame when carey mulligan sings ‘new york, new york’):
‘It’s actually Horvath, but having your Polish last name properly pronounced is, you know, kind of low on the list of priorities. There’s police brutality to worry about and stuff. So, um, what follows is a classic tale of jealousy … and beating it back like the Medieval dragon that it is. In this story I am Viggo Mortensen in Lord of the Rings, and jealousy is powerless against my sword. And this begins the way all stories of jealousy do – all great stories of jealousy – which is with my ex-boyfriend and my best friend fucking. And this is not just any best friend. This is a best friend who I would say looks like Brigitte Bardot had a baby with a mermaid. She literally had an open fungal sore on her face, and Matthew Perry still asked her out. So, um, I guess I’m not what you would describe as like a chill girl. I’m not like a cool, relaxed lady. Like you would never meet me and be like, ‘That Hannah! She really goes with the flow, like a funky youth!’ – you would be like, ‘Has she snorted Adderall in the last 60 minutes?’ So, when I found out about my ex-boyfriend and my best friend, um, I was really calm considering that fact. Frozen, even. You know, I tried to imagine all these horrible things like him licking her elephant tramp stamp and sucking her tiny tit while she cupped his balls and he sucked on her lip which was shaped like a rose bud, and I tried to get myself really worked up and just imagine all this horrible stuff on a loop. But the fact is, is that … I wasn’t angry … I was sad … I was sad about … what I thought they knew I was. I thought they were standing there going like, ‘Oh god! Hannah’s freaking out. She’s gonna kill a cat, and she’s gonna nail it to our door. She’s gonna cry so hard that all of Greenpoint fills with tears and it’s like fucking Waterworld.’ And you know what? They weren’t wrong. I had to fight really, really hard not to be that girl. And it wasn’t easy. I thought about, um, throwing a bike through his window, but A) he lives on the third floor, and I have very poor upper body strength and B) he probably would’ve appreciated it and been like ‘Thanks for the bike!’ I thought about sending her a text that said, ‘How does the wind feel caressing your two faces, young lady?’ But instead, I sat and cried and thought and ate and wrote and masturbated thinking about Chris Farley, which is a thing from my childhood that I haven’t fully worked through yet. When I heard tonight’s theme was jealousy, I knew that I needed an edge to my story – a real end – and that end came about 20 minutes before I arrived here, when I delivered a very nice (and not at all cheap) fruit basket to his door along with a note that said ‘Good luck. I mean it sincerely. In perpetuity, Hannah.’ ‘Cause that’s a fact! You know? I’m Hannah forever. No matter what I do. No matter whether I, you know, start a new nuclear missile crisis with my emotions or just sit back and chill and give someone a fruit basket. I can only control the mayhem that I create around me. But the crazy thing is that when I showed up, I heard screaming. And I heard my name. And I heard madness. And I knew that I was free. At least for tonight. That’s all. Thank you.’
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