The stories of good girls gone wild mirror one another. Britney Spears. Christina Aguilera. Miley Cyrus. Sara Malakul Lane.
Photo by Patipat Janthong
At 31, Lane has spent more than half her life in the public eye. Recently, however, her topless photographs have topped news of her acting endeavours. She has graduated from her roles as an aristocrat in Thai dramas, to posing nude in a bathtub, her breasts covered with instant noodles, with a toilet visible in the frame.
In another photo shoot, the actress, who comes from an aristocratic family of old Siam herself, dresses up in a white swimsuit and pushes a wheelbarrow around a construction site, pretending to drink water from pipes. In the recent film Jailbait, directed by her boyfriend Jared Cohn, Lane strips for her role as young victim sent to a female juvenile detention centre for killing her abusive father. The female prison setting called for the necessary (but not limited to) naked full body cavity search, naked solitary confinement, lesbian sex and sex with the warden. A reviewer points out Lane is nude for almost the entirety of the film.
Some may tut or frown, while others may save her Instagram pictures for later.
Or perhaps there are other lenses through which we can peer at this startling transformation. There comes a time in life when a child star inevitably drops the halo of the virgin persona to embrace the metaphorical whore. The dilemma is clear and ever-present, as is the rise of the celebrity feminists — from Beyoncé to Miley to Jennifer Lawrence to Emma Watson — who have raised the enigma of being part of an industry that perpetuates the control of women's bodies and conduct.
Lane's unique position between the stifling conservative views of Thailand and the sexually liberated climate of Hollywood further complicates the feminist polemic, even if she doesn't present herself as one. If she bears her body to the world, is the world allowed to comment on that body? In discussion of her large, supple, round breasts, could one speak of an ambitious compromise between the sanctity and privacy of a body and a woman's ability to profit in the current political economy?
Could a woman be in charge of her own body, her own image, when she propagates the conventional depiction of the sexualised female form?
Lane started modelling when she was 14 years old. She was born in Guam, to a Thai mother and an English father. She grew up in England, "in the 90s, when it was all about supermodels, I remember seeing Cindy Crawford and I just wanted to be one", she says. "When I came to Thailand, people would be like, 'Oh my god, she's so white'." Here, it seems, you have a foot in the door of the entertainment industry if you're half-Caucasian, and perhaps the other foot already on the runway.
Her career quickly took off and she was soon trapped in the role of the prim and proper princess, born into the upper echelons of society. She believed in the identity projected onto her and she assumed that role. She was young. She wasn't from anywhere. She had become a star before she became a person.
"I spent most of my teens and 20s just working really hard. I didn't go to college. I felt like this was my peak time to earn and save up money. A lot of my friends were going to college and they were going through a period when they were hugely in debt with student loans, having completed a master's degree and still not finding a job," she says. "I have always been intimidated by the fact that I didn't go to college."
Lane made the move to Hollywood about five years ago. By that time, she felt she had exhausted all her options in Thailand. She had starred in several TV series and had conquered the catwalk.
Photo by Patipat Janthong
"I felt really trapped. I've gone as far as I could in the industry," Lane explains. "I thought if I stayed, I was probably going to get more depressed and start doing drugs so I decided to get out. I'm a US citizen. I'd been acting and had somewhat of a career. I just wanted to get out no matter what I did. I could go make pies in Michigan. I just knew I had to get out."
Moving to Hollywood to "make it" is a stressful enterprise, under any circumstances. Lane had been a local hire in Thailand for the film Belly Of The Beast, in which she played the kidnapped daughter of Steven Seagal, so having films in her repertoire, she was quickly set up with an agent when she went to Hollywood.
There, Lane discarded her old identity, in search of a new one, which is what most young actors dream of doing in Los Angeles. During her first year in California, she lived quietly, solitarily. She would go to work and go home by herself, away from the influence of others. She had forgone her A-list kudos, her recognisable face, for near anonymity in LA.
"It's kind of ironic because I went to America to escape the scrutiny, only to be walking around LA with my headshot, trying to get people to hire me to become famous," she says. Her new persona included less clothing, bigger boobs, more B-movies. "My friends say I've been unThaied because they think I was tied up here," she jokes.
In 2010, Lane starred in Sharktopus, a TV-movie about a half-shark, half-octopus monster genetically engineered by the US navy. She was in several more movies that went relatively unnoticed: 12/12/12, The Wayshower, 100 Degrees Below Zero, and Jailbait. She has four movie projects coming up this year, including Scouts VS Zombies, to be distributed by Paramount Pictures.
"I'm not at leisure to pick projects right now. I'm not Julia Roberts. I'm very open about that. I'm lucky that I get quite a few offers and I read the script but I pretty much take everything I'm given at this point," says Lane.
"I'm a really open-minded person. If I don't like the story and I happen to have a better offer at the same time, then I'd obviously choose the better one. But in terms of, like, do I have religious things holding me back? No. If you have things holding you back, it's going to be very difficult to make it in such a competitive industry. There are already enough obstacles up against you. If you are going to build more obstacles by saying oh I can't do a rape scene because I'm Christian or I can't show my boobs because my boyfriend doesn't like it, you're building yourself 10 more obstacles when there are already 20 in front of you. You should probably go bake pies in Michigan if that's the case."
Travelling across the world did nothing to unshackle her from the burden of what others saw in her or want to see in her. In Thailand and in Hollywood, she is a victim of didacticism, of objectification.
She has earned herself greater exposure, but less approval from some local fans back home. She had leapt across the spectrum of the role she had once been assigned. She was a noble lady. Now, she plays scrabble naked. She was a "hi-so". Now, she is a sex symbol. She would love to play a Bond girl: "I think that's every actress' dream role."
"I think I look better in less clothing. That's just the way it is. That's what I've been doing and that's the image that's projected and that's OK with me. It's a facet of me. I wouldn't say it's all of me," Lane says.
"I take sexy pictures and that's my brand. That's what I'm doing. If a nude picture of me leaks on the internet, I'm not going to cry a river. I'm not going to freak out. It's normal. It's what I do.
"I think I'm so lucky and I get given free s**t, I get free facials, people give me clothes. If one of my nude pictures gets leaked and that's the worst thing that happens to me, then wow, I'm really lucky. I don't feel bad."
It seems Lane understands you can't have your cake and eat it too.
She unapologetically exposes her skin in her recent undertakings. She is putting herself out there. She owns it.
In exploring moral distinctions, it is not far-off to postulate how Lane has taken control of the way her image has been promulgated, assimilating her sexuality into her identity, such that it becomes lucrative. She may be a victim in the entertainment industry or she may have just taken control of our hyper-branded environment. Ambiguities cannot be cast aside.
