There's nothing new in show business about performers losing control of themselves. Orson Welles was known to abandon a movie project for weeks just so he could attend Carnival in Rio. And apparently, when plenty of other celebrities did all sorts of illegal or immoral things, the industry covered up for them. There was a prominent televison actor frm the seventies I interviewed who (off the record, naturally) admitted to the rape of a co-star after she threatened to reveal his homosexuality, which even now, he hasn't admitted publicly.
The problem today, specifically for Lindsay Lohan is that, with the internet and hundred of television signals, there is media everywhere and no one is willing to look the other way. When she acted irresponsibly at a young age, there was more belittling than understanding, at least from most parts of the media. There is not much sympathy for her problems, whatever they might be - alcoholism, drug addiction, family conflict in a broken home, or maybe just simply dumb choices by a young person.
Another problem for Lindsay is that she is just lumped in by the media with a bunch of other celebrities, including Paris Hilton, Nicole Ritchie and Kim Kardashian, none of whom have ever accomplished anything in their careers and no one knows whey they're famous. Part of that is Lindsay's fault for hanging around the party scene with this crowd. But the media is too uninformed to appreciate the fact that, unlike those others, Lindsay actually has shown a good deal of acting talent, right from her amazing dual performance in The Parent Trap at age 11. When she was about 15, she made a movie for Disney called Life Size in which the difference between her level of acting and her much older co-star, Tyra Banks, was dramatic. Then she gave an amazing performance, never really appreciated, in Freaky Friday. More recently, her more adult performances in A Prairie Home Companion, Bobby, Georgia Rule and I Know Who Killed Me were not given the attention they deserved, mostly because none of those movies were successful at the box office. When you're having off-the-set problems like Lindsay has had, suddenly the success of your movies seems to matter.
Whether or not Lindsay Lohan will regain her position as a working actress probably depends on whether she can keep her life under control and no one knows if that will happen. Other careers have seemed lost but were restarted, like Robert Downey. And it's almost forgotten now, but John Travolta's career hit a bad nosedive in the early eighties after a movie he was in received very bad reviews. There are many important people in the industry who do understand Lindsay Lohan's high level of talent and will be willing to work with her if she's not in rehab or worse. Meanwhile, until she figures out how to avoid the media spotlight, her life is like one of those movies such as EDtv, where almost everything she does is filmed. She has camera crews waiting outside her house in the morning and then literally dozens of cars follow her wherever she is going. Unfortunately, this is what she's best known for now, while other, less talented actresses are always working.
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