Allison Williams is not Marnie Michaels

Williams is happy to see how engaging and re-examination the enlargers are girls, especially since it seems so easy for young fans of the show to separate the art from the artist—and her from her character. “People often come up to me on the street and tell me they hate her or me,” Williams said. “They were very confused about whether we were the same person or not…. Now her selfishness has been categorized as self-care, or more like ‘working for you.’”

While she would never go so far as to say that she and her co-stars were treated unfairly, Williams admits that navigating her 20s while appearing on one of the trendier shows At that time, there were ups and downs. “It feels great to be a part of something where people are really digging in and taking apart, but it’s very noisy. It was really noisy,” she said. “The ability to attend something in New York City where there will be a media presence and interact with someone who has just written something brilliant and thoughtful and insightful about the show — and then someone wrote something stupid and misogynist and myopic about the show — equal parts. You have an equal chance of meeting both of them anywhere.”

Williams also had some thoughts to share about where Marnie will be in 2024, at least emotionally. “I think she’s still searching,” Williams said. “Maybe she got married again and is not married yet. She may still be doing music, but it’s not really scratching the itch she wanted. I don’t know that she realized that all the things she needed and wanted were internal. She couldn’t find them anywhere else. I wish that for her, but I think it’s still possible.” Interestingly, the actor added that she recently chatted with Dunham about what happened to Marnie after the events of the show. “Lena was saying, maybe Laurel Canyon,” Williams said. “Maybe she moved west. She’s wearing a sundress somewhere.”

Seven years after girl series finale, Williams is free to look back on this chapter of his life with unusual fondness. “That was my 20s,” she said. “That was when I entered adulthood. I did it in real life and on the show at the same time, and it was so special.” She name-checks “The Panic in Central Park,” an episode focusing on Marnie and her ex-boyfriend Charlie (Christopher Abbott), was one of the more formative experiences from her time onwards Girls. “I think about so many aspects of [that episode] happens frequently in my other work,” Williams said. “There were a lot of things I did for the first time in that episode and then I did again. Luckily, I don’t have to walk barefoot through Chinatown anymore, but if I do, I know what to put under my feet…. It’s mole skin.”