3 days ago
Step By Step star Christine Lakin, 46, rose to fame as a child actress in the '90s... see her now
Christine Lakin has come a long way since breaking out in Hollywood in the early 1990s.
The actress, now 46, got her big break as a main cast member on the sitcom Step By Step, which she starred on for 160 episodes over seven seasons.
She played Alicia 'Al' Lambert, the daughter of Patrick Duffy's character Frank, who is getting used to his new marriage to Suzanne Somers ' character Carol.
Although critics never paid much attention to Step By Step, it was popular with viewers for several seasons, though ratings began to flag by the show's sixth season.
For its seventh and final season, it moved from ABC to CBS, though that turmoil only exacerbated the exodus of viewers, and the show was canceled for good in June 1998.
Now, more than two decades after the show that gave her her big break went off the air, takes a look at what Christine looks like now.
The film and television actress was spotted out in Los Angeles this week when she attended her son Baylor's Little League game.
Christine was dressed in a sporty white tank top that highlighted her toned arms, and she paired it with acid wash jeans and brown Birkenstock sandals.
She opted for minimal makeup and covered up with aviator sunglasses and a blue denim-style LA Dodgers baseball cap.
Christine carried a bag with her son's equipment, including his baseball bat, and she also brought along a fan for the sweltering late-spring day.
Despite being decades away from the role she's best known for, she still looked shockingly youthful.
In 2014, she tied the knot with the actor Brandon Breault. In 2016, they welcomed their first child, daughter Georgia James, nine, and in late 2018 she gave birth to their son Baylor B., six.
Christine managed to make a successful transition from being a child star to an adult actor after her first series ended, and even though she's never appeared in any film or show as successful as Step By Step, she has continued to be a prolific actor and has even expanded into directing in recent years.
After wrapping on Step By Step, Christine — who described herself as a 'recovering child actor' in an interview with Voyage LA last year, became an in-demand guest star on shows including 7th Heaven, 3rd Rock From The Sun and the Touched By An Angel spinoff Promised Land.
Christine was dressed in a sporty white tank top that highlighted her toned arms, and she paired it with acid wash jeans, brown Birkenstocks, aviator sunglasses and a blue denim-style LA Dodgers baseball cap. She opted for minimal makeup
As the 2000s rolled around, she appeared in episodes of Boston Public, the original Touched By An Angel series, the cult teen mystery-drama Veronica Mars, CSI and Bones.
Her next series to get picked up was the CW's Valentine in 2008, but the series only lasted eight episodes.
Although she mostly appeared in low-budget films throughout the 2000s, she had a surprising connection to Paris Hilton's attempt to launch an acting career when she starred opposite the heiress in The Hottie And The Nottie (as the Nottie).
It took extreme makeup and prosthetics to cover up Christine's natural beauty, though she eventually gets to show off her real visage after a 'makeover.'
The film was panned by critics and earned the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actress for Paris, as well as three other Razzies.
The Hottie And The Nottie was also a failure at the box office, grossing only $1.6 million against a relatively modest budget of $9 million.
She rounded out the decade with roles in Disney's Race To Witch Mountain — which starred Dwayne Johnson, AnnaSophia Robb, Carla Gugino and Ciarán Hinds — and the all-star ensemble romantic comedy Valentine's Day.
A year later, she reunited with director Garry Marshall for a small part in his follow-up ensemble rom-com, New Year's Eve.
As the 2010s started up, Christine began a successful run as the voice of Joyce Kinney, as well as multiple miscellaneous characters, on the long-running animated series Family Guy.
She continued guest starring on shows like NCIS, CSI: NY and Modern Family, and she had multi-episode runs on Melissa & Joey and the Cartoon Network series Clarence.
Her film work in the 2010s was less prolific, but she again played a small part for Marshall in his rom-com Mother's Day, which starred Jennifer Aniston, Julia Roberts, Kate Hudson and Jason Sudeikis, among many others, and she also returned to the Veronica Mars universe with a role in the sequel film from 2014.
Christine has also established herself as a television director begin in 2012, and she got some of her most high-profile directing gigs beginning in 2018 on The Goldbergs.
She went on to direct 12 episodes of the series through 2023, along with three episodes of its spinoff series Schooled.
More recently, she helmed an episode of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.
While speaking to Voyage LA last year, she explained her shift to working more behind the camera.
'I have always been interested in the production of television and the behind-the-scenes action that goes on with live and scripted production. Being a self-starter and creating my own lane with projects was something born out of necessity in a competitive town like Hollywood, but also appealed to my creative brain to constantly try things and bring folks together to create something fun and unique.
She added that 'saying yes to opportunities that sometimes scared me, that didn't always seem like a linear path to where I thought I wanted to go' had helped her in the past and motivated her to give directing a try.
However, she found road blocks along the way since she hadn't been trained extensively as a director before trying her hand at it.
'It's hard to be competitive for that first big job when you've had no experience at that level before,' she explained. 'The feedback can feel like a Catch-22: You desperately want to prove you can do it, but folks have a hard time taking a chance on someone new.'
In the same interview, she noted that being a child actor had been a far different experience for her than it has been for other stars, both those who found success later and those who left Hollywood.
'I had the most fun working as a child and surrounded by wonderful people,' Christine admitted. 'I love the fans that still approach me today and those who are now watching Step By Step again with their kids. There's a nostalgia that, as a fan of that time, I can completely appreciate.'
