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Like now. The former child actor is the star of A Walk On The Moon, and that comeback word is floating around again.
When, in the last 20 years, was she ever away?
A Walk On The Moon is set in 1969 and stars Lane as Pearl Kantrowitz, a young housewife on holidays with her family in the Catskills. Liev Schrieber plays her square but loyal husband and Anna Paquin is their daughter.
Viggo Mortensen is the hippie salesman with whom Lane's character has an affair. It's the year of Armstrong's stroll on the moon, of Woodstock, of great change in general, all of which is reflected in the film's storyline.
The 34-year-old Lane, defending her character's choices, says "Pearl never had her teenage years." It's impossible not to wonder if Lane, having grown up in public, identifies closely with her character in that regard.
At any rate, Lane likes this character and understands her motives. "I like the title, too -- when you are standing on the moon, looking back at the earth, the earth looks so fragile. You're not connected to it anymore. It's scary, and you may not get back."
That sums up the moral dilemma faced by her character in the movie. Lane adds, "The movie addresses a lot of things, but it doesn't try to answer them. It makes people think, which is what you aspire to do."
Lane began acting in theatre in New York at the ripe old age of six -- she lied and said she was seven to get her first part.
Her film start came with A Little Romance in 1979; her co-star was Sir Laurence Olivier. It is still the movie people ask her about if they stop her for an autograph. That must be frustrating, as Lane has since starred in The Outsiders, Rumble Fish and The Cotton Club -- all for Francis Ford Coppola -- as well as Ladies And Gentlemen: The Fabulous Stains, The Big Town, My New Gun, Chaplin (as Paulette Goddard), Wild Bill, Judge Dredd and Murder At 1600, among others.
Lane was only 19 years old when The Cotton Club, plagued by problems, was regarded as the movie that would stop her career cold. Her starring role in TV's Lonesome Dove a few years later was called -- natch -- a comeback.
Meanwhile, Lane reckons A Walk On The Moon, if successful, may well be called a comeback, too. "It feels a bit like a second Little Romance," she admits, "because it's an emotional piece. It sticks with you. It's not going to fly out of your mind."
By the same token, Lane long ago stopped wondering if and when she'd have a film with the same impact that A Little Romance had. She says, "Every job you take is not a career move, nor should it be. I've been cultivating my humour about my career and trying to control my ego. I try not to make every experience the brass-ring experience. I'm trying to enjoy the moment," she says, laughing, "As Dustin Hoffman keeps reminding me to do." Hoffman is the producer of A Walk On The Moon.
Lane continues, "Every job I've taken, over the years, there's always been something I've learned. That's the trade-off for not being 15 anymore -- you know a few things."
Asked if the passage of time makes her work easier or harder, Lane laughs again. "It better get easier now," she blurts, "or I'm barking up the wrong tree, after 20 years."
Lane had a rather unusual childhood -- or no childhood at all, some would say. Her father was a New York drama coach and sometime cab driver and her mother an actress, singer and Playboy centrefold (October, 1957). After her parents were divorced, Lane moved back and forth between them.
She was independent very young. She was only 19 when she met actor Christopher Lambert and he was 27; they were married in 1988.
They have a five-year-old daughter. Her daughter has not seen any of her movies yet, as far as Lane knows. "But she saw my picture on the side of a bus for Grace And Glory. And I'm sure it's weird to see daddy in the makeup chair."
For her daughter, she hopes only that her child not choose a career based on popularity, such as acting, "because I think that just sucks, though that's the only downside."
Lane is now divorced and Lambert has remarried.
As to how she balances being a single mom and working, Lane says, "Barely. Every day is an improvization." That her daughter is school-age will soon present a logistical problem, admits mom, as most of her work is on location.
And she won't want to be pulling her daughter out of school. Lane's own education was a bit sporadic; she says when her daughter goes to high school, she may go to college. "One day I'm going to return to school and get an education," she says, smiling. "When I get that UCLA extension book, I want to do it all!" Lane exclaims, adding, "And I can't even cook yet." On the work front, what she wants to do next is a film about Jean Seberg. Lane has bought a book and a screenplay and would play Seberg herself, "Before I get too old."
Otherwise, she'll direct it. Or produce it. Whatever it takes.
She is passionate about Seberg: "There's a parallel of sorts. I was fascinated by her attempts to be loved, and how she just kept getting whacked."
She talks about Seberg's tragic life and adds, "I want to take a spin on it that would be healing."
Her next movie is for kids. My Dog Skip, which she calls, "A sort of an Old Yeller for the Millennium," co-stars Kevin Bacon and Luke Wilson.
Otherwise, claims Lane, she has no free time and no boyfriend right now. "There's the mother thing," she says, by way of explanation.
"I'll start dating when I'm about 50."