Sunday, 2 March 2008

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Lindsay Lohan opens up about recent troubles

Mean Girls star talks about how things got out of control

After baring her body – in a nude photo spread as Marilyn Monroe – Lindsay Lohan is now baring her soul.

As others speculate on the chances of her reviving her career after her troubled past year – 2007 brought everything from traffic infractions to another stint in rehab – Lohan, 21, tells Paper magazine for its March issue, "I am what I am."

And to those in Hollywood who are thinking of hiring her again: "They either want to take a chance or they don't, is how I see it," says Lohan.

In terms of her well-chronicled, pre-rehab hard-partying ways, "I had a lot going on in my life and that was a way of hiding from it," she explains. "I hadn't seen my dad; I had a lot of work stress 'cause I was constantly working and never took time to stop."

(She now considers the reconciliation with father Michael Lohan, who had spent two years behind bars on a DUI and additional charges, "good for my whole family; it's healthy.")

Admittedly, the young actress was caught up in the fast lane. "Everything was go-go-go, and the easiest thing was to run away from it, going out and drinking at night," she says. "You know, you don't have to think when you let go sometimes."

She adds, "But I didn't realize it was getting in the way of my work – what I've worked for my whole life."

That changed: "There's not really much else to do when you're sitting in a treatment center. It's like, 'Why am I here? Let's think,' " she concedes.

"Right now I just want to find a great script, a great role," says Lohan about the future. "I was so used to working and working and working, and for a good few months there was nothing for me to do. Now I know what it's like to be an out-of-work actor, and how much it scares me."

And while Lohan was in line for a role that went to Sienna Miller instead, she reportedly is in talks about a biopic about the silent-movie "It" girl Clara Bow, who was famous for her wild ways – as well as for a later mental illness that led to a reclusive old age.

"I definitely relate to a lot of the things that she went through," says Lohan. "Not with her family, but the trials and tribulations of Hollywood, to an extent."

By Stephen M. Silverman