Entertainment

5 Celebs Who Redeemed Themselves Without A TV Show

by Emma Goddard

When a collaboration between the likes of goddess Oprah Winfrey and rebel child Lindsay Lohan was in talks some time ago, and now with our nightmares becoming a reality, all I could ask was why why why why? As much as I loved The Parent Trap (mostly for Dennis Quaid and eating peanut butter with Oreos) and Mean Girls for how fetch they were, my respect for Lohan has dwindled. After several arrests, posing for Playboy and starring in a pornographic movie, it’s difficult for me to picture her comeback. Although I will likely watch the show anyway, merely to show my support for Winfrey, I still question why she chose Lohan. I get that there’s this intrigue about her and people probably want to know more about how she handled the pressure of being in the spotlight all the time, but I feel like it may be impossible for Lohan to find redemption through her new show on OWN. Instead, I much rather would have seen these celebrities have their own reality show with the talk show host.

Demi Lovato

Lovato revealed such inspiration and strength to her fans after putting her career on hold to take care of herself. After struggling with things an eating disorder and cutting, she checked in to rehab. Although she endured much physical and emotional pain for admitting to her problem, I can commend her for acting so mature about the ordeal and never once putting her personal life out there for the world to see. On the other hand, Lohan made her issues publicly evident for years and with all of her run ins with the police, it seemed like she really didn’t take any of her former punishments seriously. Plus, it’s difficult for me to look past DUIs. It’s one thing to hurt yourself, which is still horrible and saddening, but it’s another thing to allow yourself to put others in harms way.

Mark Wahlberg

You may know about Marky Mark’s hilariously embarrassing workout videos, but did you all know that Wahlberg was quite the deviant when he was younger? Prior to his career in acting, Wahlberg actually spent some time in a state prison, Boston's Deer Island House of Correction, for allegedly assaulting to men. It was after this crime and a past with drugs and other less serious crimes that he finally decided to turn his life around, crediting his wife Rhea Durham and their children for his now crime-free life. Although many still speculate as to the reason why Wahlberg was sentenced to 45 days in prison, some have reported that he beat a Vietnamese man. However, now after building his life back up, he has become a well-respected actor. Also, let's be real... his interviews would probably be much more interesting and wouldn't cause Winfrey to say he was difficult to deal with as she already has with Lohan.

Britney Spears

Shaved head, “Leave Britney alone,” and attacking paparazzi with an umbrella: those are the things we remember from Spears' major public meltdown in 2007. Needless to say, fans were shocked upon hearing the devastating news of the Oops!... I Did It Again singer. Similar to Lohan, much of her life was public before, during and after the incident. We saw a marriage in shambles and watched the developments on TV about her stint in rehab. However, while we saw many a custody battle between Spears and ex-husband Kevin Federline, she wasn’t known, like Lohan, for multiple arrests or DUIs. She was even able to turn her life around and had her I Am Britney Jean E! special , describing everything she experienced through those dark times. Yet this show, unlike Lohan’s, came out much later, after Spears had already worked back to success through her music.

Kate Moss

After the Daily Mirror published a picture of Moss in 2005, doing something with a white powder substance that many believe to have been cocaine, the model faced a lot of criticism, with major brands like H&M dropping her from their campaign, claiming that because of their demographic comprised mostly of teenage girls, Moss was “inconsistent with H&M’s clear dissociation of drugs,” according to BBC. Similarly, Burberry and Chanel also dropped her after the tabloid’s controversial picture. Yet after the talk died down, Moss now continues to be one of the most celebrated models in the world. Despite whether or not she actually did drugs since she still denies it, Moss has redeemed herself 100 percent with her budding career. Plus, she didn’t even need to have her own reality TV show on OWN to build her empire. That’s saying something.

Robert Downey Jr.

Suave and cool, you wouldn’t expect someone like our Iron Man hero to ever find himself behind bars. Yet the actor detailed his past drug abuse in an interview to Rolling Stone Magazine, explaining what it was like to be on substances ranging from cocaine to heroin and what it felt like when he found himself in prison from 1996 to 2001 for drug use and possession. Finally, in 2003, he decided to get help admitting during the interview that he needed that intervention, and finally entered rehab. Yet despite all the things he endured, it’s not often that we hear someone bring up the actors past (except for blogs like mine). However, we always have and always will hear the stories about Lohan through the ages, which is probably saying something about how she has handled her own situation versus how other celebrities have handled theirs.