Poor Lindsay has been the celebrity car crash of choice lately; two years ago, the vivacious young actress was the toast of Hollywood in smarter-than-average teen flick Mean Girls . . . these days she's rapidly on her way to becoming another overexposed (in every imaginable way) burn out.

A rather emotional Lohan admitted to an eating disorder and drug use in a recent Vanity Fair cover story . . .before insisting she was misquoted.

She's certainly not the first starlet in movie history to lose the plot, and she won't be the last; consider the case of American Pie star and one time Next-Big-Thing Natasha Lyonne, who spent the past year, according to local press reports, as a hopeless crack addict roaming the East Village. Lyonne's diaries recently turned up in a dumpster, detailing the desperate ramblings of a talented actress overwhelmed by the vicissitudes of fame and fortune . . . she was last heard of on life support in a New York hospital, suffering from hepatitis C.

Lohan recently experienced an intervention courtesy of the cast of American TV comedy show Saturday Night Live, after she turned up to host the show somewhat the worse for wear.

How do the young and fabulous end up so messed up?

Possibly because a lot of people are too busy making money out of them to care:

Lindsay Lohan has two big movies out this summer, a romantic comedy entitled Just My Luck and a Robert Altman ensemble piece, A Prairie Home Companion. She's in the papers every day, which sells the product.

It's not pretty, but hey . . .that's showbiz, babe.