The Real Reasons Lena Dunham And Jack Antonoff Broke Up
Lena Dunham and Bleachers rocker Jack Antonoff confirmed their "amicable" breakup to People in early January 2018, after more than five years together. Why did this quirky couple call it quits?
They grew apart
A source told E! News
that after more than five years together, Dunham and Antonoff just saw their lives going in different directions.
"It was mutual," the insider said. "Jack and Lena were growing apart and it just made sense for them to end their relationship where it was ... They want the best for each other no matter what. They are both moving on."
In an Instagram live shortly after the split, Dunham said she'd continue wearing the friendship ring Antonoff gave her in 2016, telling her audience (via Us Weekly), "Love is a really cool, powerful, eternal thing. It doesn't have to be defined the way, we in Western culture, define it as beginnings and ends."
Meanwhile, a source told Us Weekly that Dunham was focusing on herself post-split, adding, "Lena and Jack are no longer living together. Their breakup happened in December. Lena doesn't wish him ill-will. He was her first love. Their split was mutual. The relationship is done."
They moved too fast in the beginning
Us Weekly reported that after meeting on a blind date set up by a mutual pal, comedian Mike Birbiglia, Dunham and Antonoff moved in together right away. That puts a lot of pressure on a relationship. He told New York Magazine that they didn't waste time trying to get to know one another gradually.
"It was a blind date by modern standards. I mean, I used the Internet," he said. "I told Lena everything about my whole life, because when you really like someone, you want them to know everything about you."
He may have needed more privacy
Antonoff may have wanted Dunham to know everything about him, but that doesn't mean he wanted to share all of that information with the entire planet — and Dunham has a habit of oversharing about just about everything, especially her and Antonoff's relationship. In fact, Antonoff warned her about running her mouth too much on their very first date.
Dunham told The Hollywood Reporter, "The second night [Girls] aired was the first time I met my boyfriend; we were on a blind date. I had been metabolizing the criticism all week, and I made a really, really dumb joke that I'm perfectly fine to repeat now 'cause I was f**kin' 25. I said, 'No one would be calling me a racist if they knew how badly I wanted to f**k Drake.' He said, 'Don't say that in public; that's not going to help you.' I just didn't get it."
Dunham admitted to being against the very concept of TMI, telling NPR in 2014, "The term 'oversharing' is so complicated because I do think that it's really gendered ... Too much information has always been my least favorite phrase because what exactly constitutes too much information? It seems like it has a lot to do with who is giving you the information, and I feel as though there's some sense that society trivializes female experiences. And so when you share them, they aren't considered as vital as their male counterparts' [experiences] and that's something that I've always roundly rejected."
She pressured him to get married
In March 2015, Dunham announced that she and Antonoff wouldn't tie the knot until same-sex marriage was legalized. Once that happened, she reportedly pressured him to wed.
She explained in an essay for The New Yorker, "Had a perfectly earnest moral and political stance actually been a convenient stalling tactic? ... What followed [the ruling] was a remarkable display of emotional acrobatics on my part. As soon as Jack woke up, I informed him that he 'better not make a fool out of me,' followed by a quick 'LOL,' and then, 'But seriously. I'm going to look like a real idiot if we just sit here like losers and keep dating.' Then I tweeted, '@jackantonoff get on it, yo,' followed by my immediate and all-consuming regret," she wrote, adding, "The fact is that wanting everyone to have the right to marry and wanting to be married are two very different things."
He may not have been ready to get hitched
Dunham admitted in the same essay that Antonoff wasn't as eager to tie the knot as she was. "Partly that's because we were busy, and the ruling caught him by surprise, and his politics were pure and not as self-interested as mine were starting to feel," she wrote. "But partly, I suppose, it's because, as a man, his entire life has not been shaped by a desire for, or a rejection of, a fluffy white dress."
Antonoff often dodged the marriage question, telling Vulture in 2014, "I think all people who are in a relationships that last longer than a year start talking about that stuff. It's hard to imagine when the right time [to get married] is because things are so crazy at the moment."
He really wanted kids
Though Antonoff expressed trepidation at walking down the aisle with Dunham, he seemed pretty eager (or in his words, "desperate") to have kids with her.
Parenthood "just seems like the most fun thing in the world," Antonoff told Vulture in 2014. "I've never met people who have kids who haven't looked me in the eye and been like, 'It's the greatest thing that's ever happened.' I think it's biological. I'm 30. I'm not that young, right? I'm not, like, 24 or 22. I'm no longer in the phase of my life where I talk about everything as in the future. Like, I'm in the future."
They struggled with their fur-baby
In an essay for The New Yorker in March 2013, Dunham revealed that she adopted her beloved mutt, Lamby, without telling Antonoff.
"The main reason I shouldn't even have been thinking about dogs is that I finally have a boyfriend ... and I want to make decisions that honor and consider him. It would be a mistake to create a situation that compromised his comfort or made him less likely to squeeze me all night long. My boyfriend is allergic to dogs," she wrote, adding, "I promised everyone I won't [get a dog]. I tell my boyfriend, 'We have our whole lives for dogs.' Then, one morning, I sneak off to another rescue group in industrial Brooklyn and I take [Lamby] home."
Unsurprisingly, the endeavor didn't end well. "The minute we arrive home it gets weird: Lamby picks up a stuffed toy in his mouth and shakes it hard, as if to break its neck. He's growling. My boyfriend reaches his hand out to calm him and Lamby lunges, biting him," she wrote. "Whether it's aggression or play is unclear, but we back out of the room all the same ... [Antonoff] picks the dog up awkwardly, so that his feet flail ... Lamby tries, desperately, to bite at any part of my boyfriend's body he can reach."
Dunham sent Lamby to live at a farm for troubled dogs. The negative pet experience may have made the couple second-guess if it was ready to care for a human child.
They were too busy
Antonoff told Newsweek that a big hindrance to his relationship with Dunham was the fact that they both have crazy work schedules and an intense passion for their respective arts. "Two people who are deeply immersed in things and trying to care for each other at the same time, it's challenging," he said. "We both give ourselves over to the work that we're making, and that's a very intense experience. It's a lot for anybody to live around, let alone two people to live around."
She may have been too needy
Dunham admitted she was clingy and needy in her relationship with Antonoff, especially when he was on tour or traveling for work. In a September 2017 Instagram post, she thanked a friend who snapped her looking sullen in Antonoff's arms as he watched an event, captioning the photo, "Thank you @vladislavgrach for capturing us in our natural state — Jack full of joy and deeply in the world and me contemplative and needy. Wish my baby was here today because it's gonna be a special night... stay tuned."
A month later, she Instagrammed a paparazzi photo of her frowning and clinging to Antonoff with the caption, "Hey @jackantonoff remember your weird depression beard? Remember how depressed it made ME? Your vibe was very 'just divorced my childhood sweetheart, getting into cigars and stuff.' So glad that phase is behind us. So glad we've been together long enough to have phases. I miss you, come home soon."
On Halloween 2017, Dunham Instagrammed a snap of herself pouting and holding a stuffed animal, writing, "Made Jack buy this for me at the airport so I'd have 'something to cuddle.' Nobody worry at all! About me! Not today!"
It's unclear why Dunham, who had the funds, didn't simply travel more often to be with Antonoff and vice-versa — unless, of course, he was embracing the space from her that his work provided. For what it's worth, Antonoff's most recent post about or featuring Dunham was in April 2017.
He dissed her to his family
Awkward! Dunham admitted in November 2017 that she thought Antonoff was planning to propose to her ... when it turns out he was just venting about her to his sister.
"I thought jack was furtively planning a proposal to me with his sister and he just admitted I actually caught him 'talking s**t' about me," she tweeted (via People). "Now I literally can't sleep cuz I'm laughing too hard and I am also keeping him awake. 5.5 years, no rock and you know what? It's real nice," she wrote, adding, "Also they were huddled and I heard him say 'Lena' and 'finger' so obviously it seemed like an engagement ring talk. Anyway I want Cardi B's ring."
He may have gotten sick of her controversies
Another reason Antonoff, who keeps a mostly low profile, may have split from Dunham is the constant controversy and scrutiny that comes with everything she says and does.
In 2017 alone, Dunham claimed to have warned the Clinton campaign that Harvey Weinstein was an alleged rapist, was accused of "hipster racism," and was forced to apologize for defending a friend accused of sexual assault. That has to be exhausting for anyone around her, no? (And that's not even including everything that happened before 2017 — and there was a lot.)
He has already moved on
Though Dunham may still be wearing Antonoff's ring, it doesn't look like a reconciliation is likely. A source told Us Weekly, "The relationship is done and he has moved on ... as in he is seeing someone else." The insider claimed Antonoff's new romance is with a musician.
At the time of this writing, the lady's identity has yet to be revealed, there's a lot of speculation that Antonoff hit it off with Lorde (pictured above.) He co-produced her 2017 album Melodrama, and she has even referred to him as her "work husband" in interviews.