Lena Dunham is hosting Saturday Night Live this week, but the Girls star and creator has already gotten the SNL treatment.
Her HBO show was memorably spoofed during the September season premiere, with Tina Fey playing a fifth cast member, the Albanian Blerta, who responded to Hannah Horvath and Co.'s complaints with far more dire problems.
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Not only wasn't Dunham offended, but she also called the parody "a smart approach."
"It was one of the best things that's ever happened to me," Dunham said of the spoof in an interview that aired on Friday's Today. "I was sitting there watching that, and I couldn't believe these people that I admired were even aware enough of my work to sort of construct this parody, which felt loving. I've always been all too aware that there are things to be made fun of in the show, and I thought they took such a smart approach."
She added that she appreciated that the jokes weren't about her weight or frequent nudity on the show.
"It wasn't nudity obsessed; it wasn't, you know, all about my weight," Dunham said. "It was a really intelligent, thoughtful approach to Girls. So not only did I feel grateful that I was spared, I felt excited it existed."
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On Saturday, Dunham will be even more of a part of SNL's sketches and as she prepares to host, the SNL superfan is taking it all in.
"I love [SNL] with a passion," she said. "'Obsessed' is not too strong of a word, and being here in this space is surreal and wonderful, and I just am so excited to soak up every inch of it. I was literally, like, staring at the hair stylists as they constructed wigs today, saying, 'I want to learn your secrets.'"
Dunham even said she asked Late Night host, and former SNL star, Seth Meyers, for advice, with Meyers saying that she shouldn't offer more than three ideas for sketches.
She then prepared a few ideas for sketches and shared them with her boyfriend, fun.'s Jack Antonoff. But they decided her ideas weren't yet ready for late night.
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"I pitched a couple of them to my boyfriend," Dunham said. "He was like, 'Those are ... I think you should keep them in our house.' "
That also seemed to be the case for Today host Savannah Guthrie's pitch to join the cast of the HBO show as the fifth Girl.
Guthrie presented a few storyboards, showing how she could contribute to the show as Hannah's responsible friend, including helping her study for the bar exam "because I don't think she's achieving her potential," Guthrie said.
"I'll take it back to the writer's room and we'll ... give it serious consideration," Dunham said, laughing.
