My whole background is character acting: weird costumes, fat suits, playing men, playing animals – I’ve never played anyone with whom there’s any overlapping Venn diagram.

I will never actually be able to know what it’s like to go through life in someone else‘s body.

I wake up every morning thinking I need to be edgier.

In most cases, no one asks what I think, and so for me to be ready to volunteer it unprompted, I have to feel very ready to accept whatever is coming next.

There’s no trajectory to follow. Even if you were to say, ‘OK, I’m going to model my ascent based on this other person‘s,’ luck and timing play such a big part that it’s really futile.

I auditioned for ‘Girls’ the fall after I graduated from Yale. The show has been amazing – as close to perfect as it gets!

Even when I was a child, my best friend was a 92-year-old woman.

I started out really into musical theater. So you can imagine I was super popular. I wasn’t awkward looking at all.

I’d be worried about myself as a human if I hadn’t been nervous.

I would never tell someone else how to use their platform, because I think I’m much more comfortable allowing the work that I do to speak for itself.

My dad keeps joking about sneaking into my grandparents‘ house and switching out their HBO for PBS so they think I’m on ‘Downton Abbey.

I always ask, ‘Is this movie essential? Does this movie need to exist? Does it need to exist right now?’ And the answer to that is almost always no.

Sometimes fake laughing is hard once you’ve done a scene 18 times. I don’t want to brag, but I have a reputation for being very, very good at that. It’s funny finding what’s challenging about acting as you go.

Look at Jennifer Aniston: She’s America‘s sweetheart for a reason. You know what she‘s going to look like when she shows up to something, and there’s something so comfortable about that.

I know what I’m like when I don’t have a project coming up, and that’s the mode I’m almost more comfortable in. That’s when I get really scrappy and creative.

I am traditional: a big note writer, and I like using the phone.

Everyone wants to feel like they were the one and only person that the other person could ever fall in love with.

When I graduated from college in early 2010, I decided that I needed to create a calling card, some kind of business card that people can link to my name and face. So I did this ‘Mad Men Theme Song… With a Twist‘ music video. I released it just as I moved to L.A.

I will have my publicist pull pictures of the way I look at events so I can see, ‘Oh, that cut is not as flattering as I thought,’ or ‘I should smile bigger,’ or ‘That positioning is odd.’ I learn from it.

I operate with this sense of needing to live up to what I am asking of people. I am, by far, my own worst critic.

I love seeing blank days in my calendar.

I don’t understand how some of these young actresses are wearing such provocative, editorial items, when they haven‘t even established a career yet. It’s hard to see past that. I’m not so sure that’s smart in the long run.

I’m a major breath person, so I always have gum, mints.

I’m drawn to what I’m drawn to. I wear jeans and loafers everyday, mostly casual, but when I really turn it on, I like a classic, simple look.

I love making people uncomfortable, and when people say, ‘I cringed watching [that] scene,’ that’s the biggest compliment you can give me.

I’m a big Aqua fan. ‘Barbie Girl’ was a big deal growing up.

‘Girls’ was my first audition. I’d just taken an audition class, and I was excited to implement those tools.

A lot of guys I know loved ‘Sex and the City.’ They’ll take it to their grave, but they watched every episode of it.

I want to play a villain. I want to play a romantic heroine.

It’s safe to say I’m a comedy nerd. I listen to so many podcasts. I just love to laugh.

I think I’ve always had that bird‘s-eye view of myself. I think it’s an actor trait… Sometimes it’s best just to get lost out there, but other times you have to be aware of where the light‘s hitting you.

It’s very weird waking around a corner and being nose to nose with myself on the side of a bus. And Times Square – that’s the craziest one.

I was only allowed only to watch public television until I was 12 years old. I would come home from friends‘s houses with a list of demands. ‘OK, We have all the wrong cereals. You guys are asleep on the job.’

My mom has beautiful eyes, and I inherited a lot of her rituals, accentuating eyes.

I’m very protective; it’s in my wiring.

The blessing of having your first project be something as fantastic as ‘Girls’ is that it gave me room to be selective because I didn’t feel pressure to do other things. The curse is that my standards were really high.

Catherine Keener is everyone‘s dream sister slash mom slash aunt.

The Emmys is great, but the Golden Globes, you have the stars of television and the stars of movies in one place.

I can rap. Not openly in the world, but it’s important that people know! I can rap for a very specific reason, which is that in college I was in an improv comedy group, and we did musical improv.

I am not someone who thinks that a million products will mean that you’ll look perfect.

The idea of a young girl who knows exactly what she wants with her life is the most threatening and unappealing thing you can imagine.

Showing ‘Get Out’ to a room full of strangers and having them react lets them be introspective and see the way certain images affect other people.

It’s a normal thing for people to do, going on Facebook and seeing pictures of their exes with their new significant others.

The idea of doing something that I’ve never done before, that presents a new challenge, that forces me to stretch in some way – that’s kind of a perfect project for me, and especially something that has greater social, conversational ramifications. I mean what more could you want?

I am in the fortunate-enough position where I can be picky.