Media

Plug pulled on Lena Dunham’s Lenny Letter website

Lena Dunham’s feminist-leaning site, the Lenny Letter, is shutting down.

The website from the co-creator of HBO’s “Girls,” which blasted twice-a-week emails with articles on women’s topics, will cease operations on Friday, The Post has learned.

A rep for Dunham did not respond to requests for comment.

Rumblings of Lenny’s closure began to trickle out earlier this week when freelance writers were notified by editors that they would receive “kill fees,” or compensation for written works that haven’t been published.

The newsletter had always struggled for ad support, according to industry sources, and a series of controversies hasn’t helped. Last November, Dunham caught flak when she defended former “Girls” writer Murray Miller after an actress accused him of sexually assaulting her in 2012.

Lenny Letter’s readership has plunged precipitously since July 2017, sources said, when it reportedly had 500,000 subscribers, with nearly half of them still opening its newsletters.





Launched in 2015, Lenny Letter was the brainchild of Dunham and Jenni Konner, her co-creator for the “Girls” series. In its early days, it generated buzz with articles penned by stars like Jennifer Lawrence, who wrote about the gender wage gap in Hollywood, and Alicia Keys, who talked about her decision to start wearing little to no makeup.

Months after its launch, Dunham and Konner inked a deal with Hearst Digital Media to handle advertising sales for the newsletter. At the time, sources at Hearst had expressed frustration about its inability to drum up meaningful revenue.

Late last year, rival magazine publisher Condé Nast poached Lenny from Hearst to sell ads, and potentially distribute content across its various websites. That deal was said to take effect in 2018.

Condé declined to comment.





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