Jemima Kirke wanted to quit Girls after first series

Actress Jemima Kirke wanted to quit Girls before season two started.

The hit TV show, created by Lena Dunham, is gearing up for its sixth and final season, which airs from February. The series has made stars out of lead actresses Lena, Jemima, Zosia Mamet and Allison Williams, but Jemima, who plays free-spirited Jessa Johansson, nearly jumped ship in 2013.

"I think it's time for us to disclose to the world that, like, three days before season two, Jemima tried to quit," Lena laughed to Glamour magazine. "I remember being in a cab. And Jemima called me. She was like, 'I have to tell you something. It's not a big deal. I don't want you to freak out. I want to quit the show.'"

Jemima was quick to add she was questioning a lot of things at the time.

"My sense of who I was and what I wanted was really thin," she admitted. "I really wasn't sure what... I was doing."

As the creator of Girls, Lena shouldered a lot of the show's pressure. And even after season one in 2012 was a hit, the 30-year-old writer and actress admits she felt lonely at times.

She also says there were occasions where she pushed herself to exhaustion when it came to making the comedy-drama.

"Making my deal with HBO as a 23-year-old woman, I felt that I had so much to prove," she recalled. "I felt like I had to be the person who answered emails the fastest, stayed up the latest, worked the hardest. As much as I loved my job, I really, like, injured myself in some ways.

"If I had felt like, 'You're worthy of eight hours of sleep, not four; you're worthy of turning your phone off on a Saturday,' I don't think it would have changed the outcome of the show. (But) I could have worked with a sense of joy and excitement, rather than guilt and anxiety of being 'found out.'"