As a celebrity of a certain caliber, the kind that becomes more known for their personal antics than their “artistic output,” it can be second nature to toe a line between being made fun of and making fun of oneself. Because Lindsay Lohan came of age during the advent of TMZ and the associated new level of paparazzi vulturedom, all of her mistakes were easily and readily documented, most especially those pertaining to her driving and drugging–and the toxic relationship between the two. And even though this was all roughly a decade ago (despite the fact that Lohan’s legal troubles took other detours, as was the case when she stole a necklace from a Venice Beach boutique), it is still the one aspect of Lohan that the public seems to remember apart from Mean Girls.
This much was proven during a rare U.S. interview given by Lohan back in January on The Wendy Williams Show (possibly because Lohan has had little to promote). Soon into the seventeen minutes and twenty-two seconds, Williams brings up, “We did a story here on the show where you were involved in some sort of motor vehicle situation–” “What? How many times? What do you mean? Once?” Lohan interjects in this sort of way that infers self-protection, wanting to ridicule her past decisions before someone else can. It’s a defense mechanism she’s publicly bore ever since her infamous funnyordie.com spoof of an eHarmony (some of you won’t remember what that is) profile in April of 2009, following her breakup with Samantha Ronson (another thing some of you won’t remember happening). As she self-deprecatingly discusses a few of the qualities she’s looking for in a boyfriend (or girlfriend), Lohan “playfully” remarks, “I’m looking for someone who I can spend the rest of my life with–or at least the rest of my probation with…. I’m looking for a compatible mate who likes a night out on the town–as long as he or she is driving, of course–likes ankle monitoring bracelets and doesn’t have family members quick to issue restraining orders.” To that point, another aspect Lohan pretends to enjoy making light of in addition to her legal troubles is the ones she has in love. When Williams queried, “Is there a special man in your life?” Lohan tittered, “I’ve had enough relationships. I’m good.”
Nine years later, Lohan is showcasing the same shtick as she did in ’09 for a lawyer.com commercial that truly reveals just how far one can go down the hole called rock bottom in ways not pertaining to drugs. And no, even at Kim Kardashian’s most desperate “closet organizing” phase, she never did a commercial for the company co-founded by Robert Shapiro (her father’s fellow O.J. Simpson defense attorney), legalzoom.com. Somehow, Lohan still sees fit to fall into the trap of letting people classify her as a trainwreck–even though she also expressed her vexation over constantly having the same tired joke about her party girl past perpetually thrown in her face to Williams in the same interview, upon being asked, “What is the biggest misconception about you, Lindsay?” Barely missing a beat, Lohan gets the closest she’s ever gotten to brutal honesty without veering toward her signature laughing self-belittlement, commenting, “I think it’s hard because it is frustrating to me when people always say, you know, ‘those partying days’ and stuff because I was never really a partier–just because I was seen out at clubs, you know, made some mistakes, they didn’t get the best shots of me. Elizabeth Taylor always said, ‘Why do they always take the ugly ones as time goes on?’… I don’t like when people always bring up and rehash the past, you know. This was actually quite a long time ago if you think about it now. And I’d rather just stay focused on what I wanna do next, and whenever people bring up the past, things that I’ve experienced and gone through, like jail, working at the morgue–which is actually really traumatizing stuff–it distracts from maybe meeting with people to [discuss projects] and maybe doing a Mean Girls 2. It really distracts people and then they only think about the negative, and I don’t think that that’s a way to really move forward in life.”
And now, barely two months later, we see Lohan surrender to making herself the butt of a tired joke (one almost as tired as the irrelevant “wisecrack” Snapchat recently allowed to be made about Chris Brown and Rihanna)–yet again for the sake of what amounts to a nominal paycheck in comparison to the continued damage it’s causing to her reputation, one she’s no stranger to staking through the heart (just three years ago in 2015, she also agreed to an Esurance commercial for the Super Bowl mocking her driving abilities).
Thus, while we watch her jest, “When lawyer.com first reached out to me, I was confused…and a little scared–because I thought I was in trouble,” it can be difficult to sympathize with her wondering why people won’t let her shake the past. She then goes on to explain that the company simply wanted her to be (for some inexplicable reason) their spokesperson. She adds, “From getting a DUI (let’s not pretend I didn’t get one, or two, or three… or some others)… we’re always here for you.” A laugh and a wink at the end. Hahaha! This is so funny! I’m still talking about my problems from the mid-00s! This isn’t degrading at all! the laugh and wink seem to mean. Gritted teeth and all, it is with this commercial that we see inside the strange psychology of Lohan, who wants to be both free of this overplayed image, but also doesn’t quite know how to remain in the spotlight without it.
https://youtu.be/gDg1LF811SQ
