Lena Dunham describes Adam Driver's 'short-tempered' behavior on 'Girls'

Lena Dunham says in her new memoir that Adam Driver could be "short-tempered," including during an incident where he allegedly threw a chair, when they starred together on "Girls."

The "Girls" creator and star, 39, wrote in her book "Famesick," published April 14, about working with Driver on the HBO series, which ran from 2012 to 2017. Driver starred as Adam Sackler, an on-and-off love interest for Dunham's character, Hannah.

In one passage of the memoir, Dunham detailed a moment where Driver allegedly became angry when she forgot her lines.

"Late one night, as we practiced lines in my trailer, I found that mine were suddenly gone," she wrote. "I knew I'd written them. I'd known them only minutes before. But when I opened my mouth, all that came out was a stammer – until finally, Adam screamed, 'F---ING SAY SOMETHING' and hurled a chair at the wall next to me. 'WAKE THE F--- UP,' he told me. 'I'M SICK OF WATCHING YOU JUST STARE.'"

USA TODAY has reached out to a representative for Driver for comment.

In another incident, Dunham recounted learning that Driver allegedly "hated his new haircut and had punched a hole in his trailer wall."

Dunham wrote that while Driver was frequently tender and loving, as costars, they "fought often," usually "about the content of a scene, what it required, and how it would be executed." But she "reasoned that the intensity of his anger at me, anger that could make him spit and throw things, was proportionate to the intensity of our creative connection."

Dunham also said she spent an "inordinate amount of time" wondering if Driver liked her.

"He could be short-tempered and verbally aggressive, condescending and physically imposing," she wrote. "He could also be protective, loving even – his eyes would flash with anger when I described mistreatment by one of the random guys I was dating, or the famous comedian in Los Angeles who showed up to my El Royale apartment without being invited, insisting – at TEN P.M. – that I had to try the matzo ball soup from Canter's."

Once, Driver, after coming over to her apartment almost every night one week, called to say he was "riding down" to see her and that "if I come up, I'm not leaving this time," Dunham wrote. But when he arrived outside, she didn't answer the phone.

"Some part of me knew – some wise part of me, some bold part of me – that if we crossed whatever boundary we were threatening to cross, the return to work would be tinged with humiliation, that I'd be minimizing any authority I still had, and that, however it went, my heart – bruised but improbably not yet broken – would crack."

She continued, "We never spoke about it again, but a month later, he called to tell me he was engaged." Dunham said that it was "absurd" that she felt "heartbroken, to have thought I meant anything, that I occupied any role beyond distraction."

Driver has been married to Joanne Tucker since 2013, while Dunham has been married to Luis Felber since 2021.

In an interview with People magazine, Dunham described Driver as a "very, very serious work-focused private person" and said she has a "lot of empathy" for his unique experience of working on the show while also becoming a movie star playing Kylo Ren in the "Star Wars" franchise. She also said she and Driver have not spoken since the end of "Girls."

"The goal was never to make Adam seem like he was in any way the outlier of the show, but just to talk about how complex and confusing those first experiences of trying to be a boss were," Dunham told People, adding that "being around this very talented, charismatic, complex and powerful person affected me in ways that were really positive and in ways that were a bit harder."