Can New York save Lindsay Lohan ?

IT could be her greatest role since “Mean Girls.” Disgraced starlet ankles Hollywood for Gotham, a humbling return to the city of her birth. Able to blend in among the city’s obscuring crowds, our starlet finds peace and — eureka! — a path to redemption. Soon, she wrangles a small, serious role Off Broadway that reminds the world she can act (and show up on time). Other roles follow. Critics nod, the media applaud, Martin Scorsese is on the phone. Lindsay Lohan is back. Bow, curtain, fin. It’s not quite an original, but hey, neither was “Freaky Friday.” So we might as well ask: Can New York save Lindsay Lohan?

It is going to get its chance, according to the actor’s mother. In an Aug. 13 “Today” show appearance, Dina Lohan told Matt Lauer that her daughter would be returning to New York when her current stint in rehab ends.

“Los Angeles, it’s a little, I mean, California is a wonderful state but it’s a different game you play there,” she said.

The promise of reinvention lies at the heart of the allure of New York, a place one can simultaneously get lost and be discovered. Historically, that has attracted not just the unknown in search of fame, but the infamous seeking redemption.

Richard Nixon came to New York after losing the 1962 gubernatorial election in California, working as a lawyer and living on Fifth Avenue while he plotted his political comeback. In 2000, Monica Lewinsky moved to the West Village to start a line of handbags and blend into the crowds. Even Vincent Chase, the fictional star at the center of HBO’s “Entourage,” reignited his Hollywood career with a humbling retreat to Queens.

So why not Lindsay?

“New York City could be the savior for Lindsay Lohan,” said Ronn Torossian, a publicist who has helped stars like Lil’ Kim and Sean Combs try to restore scandal-tinged images.

Working to Ms. Lohan’s advantage, Mr. Torossian said, is the fact that she is a native New Yorker, born in the city and raised on Long Island.

“She could sell the story that she moved to L.A. and did her wild thing and got it out of her system, and then came back to New York to get serious,” he said. “That’s a story that New Yorkers could appreciate.”

Of course, to sell that story, Ms. Lohan would have to live that straight life, a struggle that goes beyond simple image rehab. And it’s worth noting that her previous visits to New York — specifically to clubs like Marquee and 1Oak, where tabloids claim she started a fight with a professional hockey player in May — have only added to her reputation as a party girl. (Ms. Lohan called the reports a fabrication.)

But for all New York’s temptations, it’s what the city doesn’t have that could make it the perfect place for Ms. Lohan to get her feet back on the ground, publicists say. For one thing, New York lacks the 24-hour paparazzi pulse that can make Los Angeles feel like a highly charged fishbowl for celebrities.

“There’s no question the L.A. paparazzi is much more aggressive” than the New York media, said Leslee Dart, a celebrity publicist whose client list includes Conan O’Brien andWoody Allen (who knows a thing or two about New York redemption). In New York, celebrities are — relatively speaking — left alone to live their lives, she said.

“Every day in Manhattan celebrities are dropping their kids off at private school,” she said, “the 92nd Street Y, Allen-Stevenson, and you never see photographers lining up.” In Los Angeles, she said, outlets like TMZ and “Access Hollywood” would gorge on such predictable routines.

That hands-off attitude toward celebrities also extends to Gotham’s people, who generally consider themselves above gawking at the rich and famous. After all, being star-struck implies that someone is richer, more important or better connected than you.

“I can tell you I have many clients who live in New York who take the subway and are never bothered,” Ms. Dart said. “It’s much easier to be anonymous in New York.”

What New York does have is the theater, which has long served as a sort of outpatient clinic for celebrities looking to rehab their careers.

In the early 1980s, when Linda Ronstadt’s personal relationship with Jerry Brown, then governor of California, threatened to overshadow her career, a star turn in “Pirates of Penzance” helped her get back on track. In 2002, Anne Heche — whose ill-fated foray into same-sex coupling with Ellen DeGeneres was overshadowed only by stories of her alien alter-ego named “Celestia” — refocused attention on her acting skills with a well-received turn in “Proof.”

Katie Holmes (“All My Sons”), “American Idol’s” Frenchie Davis (“Rent”) and Lance Bass (“Hairspray”) have all — to varying degrees of success — recently used Broadway appearances to turn attention away from their personal lives and toward their careers.

The strategy works, says Richard Kornberg, a veteran Broadway press agent, because people seem to perceive theater work as more honest than film. Getting up in front of a live audience eight times a week — and not being paid seven figures to do it — separates real actors from mere celebrities in the minds of the public.

“The press themselves treat people differently when they become a person of theater,” he said. As for Ms. Lohan, “she can act, and I believe she can sing.”

When even David Hasselhoff can top a Broadway marquee, surely there’s a producer willing to take a chance on Ms. Lohan. After all, New York’s willingness to forgive has always stemmed from its obsession with success, said Elizabeth Bradley, an assistant director at the New York Public Library who has written extensively on early New York.

“The Dutch were famously tolerant of anybody who could help them make a profit,” she said. In Colonial New York, she said, “it didn’t matter where you came from or what religious sect you were from, it was whether you were good at making money.

“That certainly was not true of New England and the southern colonies.”

If that mind-set still prevails, then Ms. Lohan will find no shortage of people willing to forgive her sins in pursuit of profit. The trick will be finding the right ones.

Of course, as the self-help mantra goes, neither New York, nor anyone else, can really save Lindsay Lohan — Ms. Lohan must save herself. But at the very least, New York has one advantage over Los Angeles when it comes to staying out of trouble. As Mr. Kornberg put it, “You’re not going to have a car crash when you’re in a taxi.” Or, if you do, you can just pay the fare and walk away.

Source: NYTimes