Lena Dunham snared her first Saturday Night Live hosting gig at the best possible time. Her HBO series Girls could sure use a PR boost.
The media long ago declared Girls the Next Great Television Series without noticing how few people actually watch it. Scribes were equally effusive about Dunham despite a thin track record.
Dunham’s “breakout” film, the 2010 indie dramedy Tiny Furniture, barely registered on the pop culture radar The 2012 feature Nobody Walks, which she co-wrote, earned a grand total of $25,342 during its brief theatrical window.
Now, the audience for Girls in season 3 continues to shrink while HBO’s new series True Detective manages to add viewers each week.
According to Nielsen estimates, “True Detective” averaged 2.6 million viewers for its 9 p.m. episode — up 16% from the previous week (2.24 million) and 13% higher than its series premiere on Jan. 12 (2.3 million). Across its three plays for the night, “Detective” cumed 3.6 million viewers, also a series high….
“Girls” followed at 10 p.m. with 916,000, down from the previous week’s 942,000, and a total of 1.3 million for the night.