Lindsay Lohan's Career Deserved More Than Tabloid Drama
Revisiting a misunderstood icon’s career cut short by the cost of fame and public scrutiny–20 years later
After watching Mean Girls, I went down a Lindsay Lohan rabbit hole.
I watched a couple of her movies while discovering way more about her personal life than I wanted to know.
I did this to myself. But when I saw Mean Girls and noticed how talented Lohan was at only 17, I wanted to know why I hadn’t heard of her before so I researched her.
Sadly, now I know why.
But before I go down that path, I want to talk about some of the movies she made during that era because they deserve to be remembered.
I decided to watch Freaky Friday, Just My Luck, and Falling for Christmas to understand the trajectory of Lohan’s career. She made Freaky Friday during her prime celebrity and cultural icon. Just My Luck was made during her drug addiction years. And Falling for Christmas was after she was sober/recovered and much older.
Freaky Friday is arguably Lohan’s big break in the movie industry. It’s between that and Mean Girls, but they came out so close together that I can’t say which made her a star.
I loved Freaky Friday.
I’ve learned that I am a sucker for teen comedy movies, which is why I loved Mean Girls. Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis had amazing chemistry on screen. And the fact that they made Lohan’s character a musician made me love the movie so much more because she felt relatable—unlike the other adaptations of Freaky Friday.
It was easy to tell that Lohan’s acting hadn’t taken a turn for the worse yet. She was amazing in the dual role, and not many actresses her age at the time could have pulled it off—sober or not.
2006 was when Lohan’s career took a turn for the worse.
Imagine it’s 2004–
You just filmed the most popular teenage movie that year.
You were the lead role and got a huge paycheck.
But you’re still only 17 years old.
That was Lindsay Lohan.
She was riding high off the back-to-back success of Freaky Friday and Mean Girls and she started partying nonstop. But she was a teenager, so it seemed normal.
Then it got worse. Partying turned into addiction and public displays of hot-messery.
I don’t blame the girl for being 17.
Her public feuds with Paris Hilton and Hilary Duff didn’t help the situation. Notice I said “public”—the media WOULD NOT LEAVE HER ALONE.
But anyway, now to Just My Luck.
I remember seeing reviews where people said the decline in her acting quality was noticeably bad in Just My Luck. Back then, there were only rumors about her addiction, but now it’s confirmed that she was a mess during the filming of this movie.
I didn’t expect to see that much difference in her acting ability (It’s still Lindsay Lohan).
I was wrong.
I could tell something was off. I tried to pinpoint what exactly was wrong. I think it was mixture of her voice and the overall aura she gave off on screen. It just felt different.
But nonetheless, I enjoyed Just My Luck. She and Chris Pine had great chemistry together, and it was very sad to find out that the behind-the-scenes experience wasn’t pleasant for Ms. Lohan.
After Just My Luck, she fell into legal trouble and went on an acting hiatus for nearly a decade. Since I didn’t know who she was at the time, I didn’t realize she was gone. But according to people around then, it was sad to see someone with as much talent as her fall apart.
After getting sober in 2014, she moved to Dubai to start a new life. It was clear that the Lindsay Lohan we knew from Mean Girls and Freaky Friday was gone.
Until 2022–
Lindsay Lohan returned to the United States looking like a new person, with a husband and a child. Netflix revealed that Lohan was set to star alongside Chord Overstreet in the Christmas rom com Falling for Christmas, which came out later that year.
While it’s upsetting to see that Ms. Lohan has had to resort to Netflix rom-coms, I think I speak for many when I say that I’m happy she was able to return to the film industry. I’m just saying that she deserves more than that.
So, I decided to watch Falling for Christmas to see what it was all about.
It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad either. It’s exactly what you’d expect from a Christmas rom-com.
And Lindsay Lohan did a good job in her first movie after returning to film. While she’s older, she still has the charm of her 16- to 20-year-old self. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the Lindsay Lohan from Mean Girls didn’t fully disappear.
Netflix saw something in her too, signing her to a two-picture deal. Both movies came out last year: Irish Wish and Our Little Secret.
From what I’ve seen in the reviews, they aren’t good movies.
BUT they were good enough to get Lindsay Lohan an opportunity to make Freakier Friday, a sequel to Freaky Friday, set to release in August 2025.
So, in conclusion, is Lindsay Lohan perfect? No. But is anybody perfect? Also no.
Many people make big mistakes in life—some not as big as Ms. Lohan’s but some probably worse.
She was just a kid.
A kid who got too much attention before she was ready for it while the world watched as she struggled and fell apart.
I’m about that age and I can’t image that kind of pressure.
I’m happy to see Ms. Lohan turn over a new leaf and get the career she always deserved. I’m just waiting for that Robert Downey Jr.-type comeback. The one that comes with respect, power, and a big paycheck. Maybe that kind of comeback isn’t reserved for former teen girls.
I have nothing but respect for her and can’t wait to see the amazing things she does in the future.