172. Doing Her Very Best – Lena Dunham
Photo credit: Everett Collection
I wish I could talk to Brittany Murphy. I wish I could tell her I understand—that she wasn't giving up towards the end but rather trying so hard.
I think a lot about Brittany Murphy. I probably think about Brittany Murphy more than you think about Brittany Murphy, probably more than anyone who didn't know Brittany Murphy thinks about Brittany Murphy. Her death at age 32 in 2009, from pneumonia, anemia, and a cocktail of prescription and over the counter drugs, hit me harder than the deaths of rock legends or state leaders or even certain relatives. I followed the details obsessively, trying to piece together a story that made sense and didn’t fully upend the image of Brittany Murphy I had cherished and mourned during her lifetime.
It started with Clueless. That film was a turning point for me (not alone here) and I decided, quickly and with soul-affirming clarity, that I was a Tai. Her awkward heaving bosom, her slight Jersey accent obscuring her sharp intelligence, her bumbling cheer in the face of the sleekest girls of Beverly Hills—this was the best version of teenage-hood I could hope for and anyway, she had all the killer lines (“you’re a virgin who can’t drive”).
Then there was Daisy, the emotionally stunted rotisserie chicken lover in Girl, Interrupted, pulsing with fragile rage. Angelina may have won the Oscar, but Brittany made me realize we were all just a step from breakdown. She opened me up to the concept of living without judgment because nobody is immune from paralyzing pain.
And then, just like that, she transformed, dropping an alarming amount of weight and blonding herself beyond recognition. There was an odd sense of betrayal—I was a chubby high school senior, a Tai—and I watched alone in my bedroom as she and her brand-new boyfriend Ashton Kutcher hosted the MTV New Year’s Eve show. Interviews of the two showed her joyfully giggling as he fielded serious questions about their upcoming film Just Married with "cuz she's so freakin' hot." He was mostly interrupting her. She was mostly loving it.
I can imagine now what that must have felt like—the former chubby girl and the cartoon boyfriend hottie, the traces of her former self replaced with jagged edges and puffed lips and the knowledge that she was desired by someone who was desired by everyone. When their relationship ended, I crafted a narrative to try and understand: he was just a buffoon and she was too emotional, too in tune, too much for someone with his limited ability to understand the essential frailty of the human state. There were more romances, both rumored (Eminem, who I’d hazard to guess is a complex guy to date) and confirmed (two broken engagements with behind the scenes guys). She would hurt but she'd be better for it, just like every woman who has ever seen a man shrink away in horror upon finally witnessing their totality.
At this point her career careened between thrillers where her delicacy and shaky beauty were on display and rom-coms where she operated someplace between Lucille Ball and Nicolette Sheridan. Having two modes, diametrically opposed and feeding each other, is not unfamiliar to me: the broken girl and the adorably clumsy one, the crazy one and the crazy one. The schism is a gift and a curse, a skill of illusion that ultimately creates a deep sense of isolation.
In 2007 she married Simon Monjack, a portly Brit who was widely considered to be a con man. He moved into the Hollywood Hills home that she shared with her mother. She continued to appear on red carpets, glassy eyed and clinging to her husband. Her lips were bigger still. Her films went straight to video.
In December of 2009 she collapsed in her bathroom and died just a few hours later. Simon Monjack and her mother did the talk show circuit and on Larry King he casually called his mother-in-law “baby.” They insisted that Brittany only took opiates during “that time of the month” and that she was petrified of other drugs due to a heart murmur. She ate like a pig. She’d been happy. Six months later Simon Monjack was found dead in their shared bed, also from pneumonia and anemia. The horrifying poetry of it was noted by tabloid outlets then forgotten.
When I came to Hollywood in 2010 I was as sure of myself as anyone had ever been. I knew how I liked my hair (unbrushed), my jeans (skin tight), and my men (anyone willing to kiss me). I was a bubbling fountain of ideas and I posed pigeon-toed for whoever asked me. I felt lucky to be chosen, but then, upon realizing the stakes, terrified to fail. A certain terror replaced a long held curiosity, a lazy joy. I met a guy with a tiny apartment we barely left. I experimented with counting almonds instead of eating regular meals. I ultimately couldn’t do it, but the only thing protecting me was the control I had over my work and the love of some very thoughtful people. I could have become stick-like, clutching someone who made big promises. I could have leaned on a lost, daffy persona. My public mistakes have all been played out in the realm of language, slips of the tongue and intellectual fumbles, casual fuck-ups in a world where keeping your shit in check equals staying alive. But they could just as easily have been Ashtons and Eminems and talent managers who bought me fat diamonds. I could have convinced the doctor I needed more drugs, and more still. I have before.
I wish I could talk to Brittany Murphy. I wish I could tell her I understand—that she wasn't giving up towards the end but rather trying so hard. Maybe she thought eschewing food would give her back her sense of control, wrestle it away from her mother or her husband or the people who had decided who she was and what she could be. Maybe she thought the prescription drugs would quiet her fear and give her some sense of joy, of peace, of possibility. Maybe she thought the cold medicine would get her on her feet again, back to set where she belonged, performing like she had since childhood. Maybe, just maybe, it would all coalesce, she'd remember why she came to Hollywood in the first place, and she'd be back in the warm patch of sun that shines on the people doing their very best.
– Lena Dunham
