Lynn Hirschberg is an American journalist who has written for Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair and the New York Times. Since 2008 she has been the interviewer of the online video series Lynn Hirschberg's Screen Tests where she interviews celebrities for W magazine.
Career
In 2008 Hirschberg created Lynn Hirschberg's Screen Tests for . The Screen Tests were a series of short black and white videos featuring close ups of celebrities answering questions Hirschberg had posed. In 2010 Hirschberg left T: The New York Times Style Magazine to work at W magazine and carried over her Screen Tests series. In 2015 Hirschberg began a new video series, again for W, called Birthday Stories featuring actors, models, and designers discussing their birthdays. in 2020 Hirschberg began a new podcast for W Magazine, 5 things with Lynn Hirschberg, in which she asks high-profile celebrities about a person, place, thing, and two experiences that have affected their lives.
Controversies
Hirschberg has been the subject of ire from several of her interviewees. In 1992 she wrote a piece for Vanity Fair about Courtney Love who was then pregnant with her daughter Frances Bean Cobain. Hirschberg quoted Love talking about taking heroin while pregnant. As a result, Cobain was removed from the care of her parents by child protective services shortly after her birth while an investigation was launched. In response Love left Hirschberg a threatening message on her answering machine. Love also recorded and released a bootleg song called Bring Me the Head of Lynn Hirschberg. In 2010 Hirschberg interviewed rapper M.I.A. for . In the piece she contrasted the rapper's luxurious lifestyle with her political viewpoints in unflattering ways, leading to criticism from M.I.A. who would later release her own audio of the interview as well as releasing Hirschberg's telephone number through Twitter. In response the editors of T issued a statement clarifying that some of the quotes were taken out of context and published out of order.
