Lindsay Lohan. Photo credit: Mike Ruiz

Lindsay Lohan has been sent home from rehab 68 days early. What’s next?

Lindsay Lohan  is back in the driving seat: First she was released from jail after serving 13 days of her 90 day sentence, and then she was allowed to leave rehab after only doing three weeks of the originally prescribed 90 day stint. The first thing she did upon release? According to TMZ, it was to head down to the Santa Monica Department of Motor Vehicles to get her driving licence back. A nice touch, seeing as she got into all this trouble in the first place for driving under the influence.

The celebrity gossip scene is rife with “concern” and speculation over how long Lindsay can keep her nose clean this time. US magazine caught one of the first pictures of the post-rehab startlet in which she was brandishing a can of “the world’s most powerful energy drink”, Rockstar. “Should the actress be downing the beverage?” US worried, unconvincingly. “Like all energy drinks, Rockstar is loaded with caffeine (and sugar) which can make her jittery, cause insomnia and increase anxiety.”

Meanwhile Linday’s stalwart Twitter-attacker Joan Rivers has promised, “I’ll be nice – until she does the first insane thing, which will probably be 20 minutes after she’s out. But you can hope that it won’t be.”

Others have been more hopeful, going as far as to speculate that the actress could become known for more than being “troubled,” perhaps even acting. Lindsay’s mother expects that a return to New York, the town of her birth, would help. She told the Today show, “Los Angeles, it’s a little, I mean, California is a wonderful state but it’s a different game you play there.”  This prompted The New York Times to pose the question: “Can New York save Lindsay Lohan?” “The promise of reinvention lies at the heart of the allure of New York, a place one can simultaneously get lost and be discovered.” The paper speculated that Lohan could be saved by the reduced paparazzi and Broadway theatre scene in NY. “The press themselves treat people differently when they become a person of theater,” Richard Kornberg, a veteran Broadway press agent told the paper. “She can act, and I believe she can sing.” Even if treading the boards doesn’t boost her reputation, The Times suggests that typical New Yorkers’ predilection for taking taxis over driving might. “Of course,” conlcuded The Times, “as the self-help mantra goes, neither New York, nor anyone else, can really save Lindsay Lohan — Ms. Lohan must save herself.”

A court hearing in Beverly Hills has laid down rigorous outpatient rules for Lohan. For the next three months, she must undergo psychotherapy four times a week, have counselling five times a week and take two drug tests a week. Are her wild days over? Gawker.com didn’t know, or didn’t care. The site noted that, upon leaving rehab, Lindsay was “spirited out the back” into “a luxurious hot-air balloon piloted by a talking dog, and, after launching into space, was never seen again.” The real question may be whether a young celebrity could cope when Gawker.com no longer cares.