Lena Dunham apologizes to Allison Williams for making her sing Tracy Chapman’s ‘Fast Car’ on “Girls”
“I’d be like, ‘It’s not going to be a big deal.’ And then those are the things that become memes for the next 20 years.”
Lena Dunham is looking in the rearview back to when she put Allison Williams through the wringer while they were shooting Girls.
The series creator jokingly apologized to Williams for making her sing so many songs throughout the hit HBO comedy after a clip of her character Marnie’s rendition of “Fast Car” resurfaced following Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs’ acclaimed performance of the track at the 2024 Grammys.
“I love that Allison would constantly say when we were shooting Girls, ‘Oh my God, are you really going to make me sing this? This is so embarrassing,'” Dunham recalled in a new interview with Variety. “And I’d be like, ‘It’s not going to be a big deal.’ And then those are the things that become memes for the next 20 years.”
She then concluded, “So I’m sorry, Allison.”
@hbo You’re either the Marnie or the Hannah. #Girls #HBO #GirlsHBO ♬ original sound – HBO
Williams’ Marnie starts jamming out to Chapman’s beloved 1988 song in the Girls season 6 finale while driving her best friend, Hannah (Dunham), and her son, Grover, upstate. After repeated attempts to get Marnie to stop, Hannah ultimately ends up shouting at her and causing Grover to burst into tears.
Following Chapman and Combs’ powerful Grammys performance earlier this month, HBO reposted the scene on TikTok with the caption: “You’re either the Marnie or the Hannah.”
Lena Dunham and Allison Williams on ‘Girls’
If the clip went through an online cultural resurgence following the awards show, it wasn’t the only thing brought back to life — Chapman’s original “Fast Car” rocketed to No. 1 on the iTunes chart shortly afterward, too.
But no matter how embarrassing Marnie’s “Fast Car” moment may be, it can never top the scene in season 2 when she interrupts her ex-boyfriend’s tech party to kick-start her music career with a truly harrowing cover of Kanye West’s “Stronger.”
“I will credit her for some of the lyric changes in that,” Dunham said about the performance, in which Williams sings, in part, “You can be my white Kate Moss tonight.”
Added Dunham, “We’re very grateful to Allison.”
