The 10 Funniest People, Videos and Things of the Coming Year

Call her the anti-Sex and the City: 24-year-old Lena Dunham, whose massively buzzy debut movie, Tiny Furniture (which she wrote, directed and stars in as a Lena Dunham-ish college grad who moves back into her parents' downtown New York loft), got her noticed by Apatow. He signed on to executive-produce Girls, Dunham's half-hour HBO pilot, which will air later this year if all goes well. The show focuses on a group of post-collegiate girlfriends: Dunham, Allison Williams (daughter of Brian) and Jemima Kirke, who played Dunham's best friend in Furniture. "I haven't seen stuff about what New York is like in the social-media age, in the recession," Dunham says. "We're all holed up in closet-size places in deepest Bushwick, tweeting at people." Apatow was blown away when he started working with her. "Lena is a very rare talent," he says. "She is insightful and hilarious and is actually in a good mood all the time. It's really weird. I have never seen that before."                           

—D.S.