What Happened to Christine Lakin? Where She Is Now in 2026

If you were parked in front of ABC’s TGIF lineup in the ’90s, you knew Al. Christine Lakin played Alicia “Al” Lambert, the flannel-wearing, wisecracking tomboy at the heart of “Step by Step,” for the show’s entire run. What a lot of fans never clocked is what happened after: Lakin didn’t fade out, she quietly built one of the busiest post-child-star careers in the business — roughly 140 acting credits and, more recently, a real reputation behind the camera. Here’s where Christine Lakin is now.

01Profile

Full name

Christine Lakin

Born

January 25, 1979 (47 years old)

Birthplace

Dallas, Texas, USA

Occupation

Actress, director, producer, choreographer

Best known for

Alicia "Al" Lambert on "Step by Step" (1991–1998)

Family

Married to Brandon Breault (2014); two daughters

Notable directing

11 episodes of "The Goldbergs"; feature debut "I Won't Dance" in development

Here’s the thing people underestimate about Christine Lakin: the goofy tomboy from a Friday-night sitcom turned into a genuine industry lifer. She kept working steadily as an actor while teaching herself the craft on the other side of the lens, and that second act is the one that’s really taken off.

02The Rise: Becoming Al Lambert

The tomboy in a blended family

“Step by Step” premiered on ABC in 1991 as part of the network’s family-comedy juggernaut, built around a “Brady Bunch”-style blended family: Patrick Duffy and Suzanne Somers as the newly married Frank and Carol, each bringing kids into the mix. Lakin, cast at just 12, played Al — short for Alicia — the middle Lambert daughter who preferred a baseball cap and a chip on her shoulder to anything girly.

Al was the show’s secret weapon. In a sea of sitcom kids, she was the one with the dry delivery and the eye-roll, the character who felt like she’d wandered in from a slightly more grounded show. Lakin grew up on that set, appearing across all seven seasons until the series wrapped in 1998.

A TGIF staple

“Step by Step” was never a critical darling, but it was a fixture — the kind of comfort TV that anchored a generation’s Friday nights and lived on in reruns. For a young actress, it was a formative, high-visibility gig. And unlike a lot of her peers, Lakin treated it as a starting line rather than a peak.

03Stepping Behind the Camera

When “Step by Step” ended, Lakin didn’t vanish — she diversified. She kept acting across film, television, and voice work, racking up a credit list that now runs to roughly 140 roles. But the more interesting shift happened gradually, in her twenties, when she found herself drawn to what was happening off-camera.

• 1991Cast at age 12 as Al Lambert on "Step by Step."
• 1998The series ends after seven seasons; Lakin keeps working steadily as an actor.
• 2000sBuilds out a wide-ranging résumé across film, TV, and voice acting while gravitating toward theater and choreography.
• 2010sEstablishes herself as a television director, including 11 episodes of ABC's "The Goldbergs."

Theater was the on-ramp. Lakin has said she started choreographing for her theater company in Los Angeles, discovered she loved shaping a scene from the outside in, and followed that instinct toward directing. It wasn’t a dramatic career pivot so much as a slow, deliberate move toward the work she found most satisfying.

04The Director and the Podcaster

A real directing career

Lakin’s move behind the camera stuck. She became a sought-after episodic television director, and she’s probably best known in that lane for helming 11 episodes of the long-running ABC sitcom “The Goldbergs” — a show whose warm, nostalgic, ensemble-comedy energy is right in her wheelhouse.

I like being behind the camera. — Christine Lakin, on her move from child stardom to directing (AOL, 2025)

That directing work reframed how the industry sees her. She’s no longer the former kid from a ’90s sitcom trying to stay relevant; she’s a filmmaker with a growing body of work and a clear point of view.

Keeping the nostalgia alive

Lakin has also leaned into the affection fans still have for her early work. Since 2024 she’s co-hosted “Keanan And Lakin Give You Déjà Vu,” a “Step by Step” rewatch podcast with former castmate Stacy Keanan, who played Dana. The two revisit the show episode by episode and swap stories from their coming-of-age years in 1990s Hollywood — with Lakin rewatching and Keanan often seeing episodes for the first time. In December 2025 she also turned up on the “Full House Rewind” podcast to talk candidly about growing up as a child actor.

05What She Is Doing Now

Her feature directorial debut

The big headline for Lakin right now is that she’s stepping up to the big leagues as a director. In November 2025, Deadline exclusively reported that Lakin is set to make her feature directorial debut with “I Won’t Dance,” a coming-of-age romantic comedy set in the world of competitive ballroom. The story follows a blue-collar “belle of the ball” forced to partner with her nemesis — the bad boy of the ballroom — for a shot at the National Teen Dance Champion title.

The project is exactly the kind of upbeat, character-driven material Lakin has gravitated toward, and it marks the natural next step after years of episodic directing. By spring 2026, the film had gathered momentum: Deadline reported that Jordan Fisher had joined to star in and produce, with production being lined up.

Still a triple threat

Lakin hasn’t abandoned the other parts of her career, either. Her Instagram bio (she’s active as @yolakin) describes her as a director, actor, producer, and choreographer — a fair summary of someone who genuinely does all four. Between the rewatch podcast, her ongoing acting and voice work, and now a feature in the pipeline, she’s arguably busier and more creatively in charge than at any point since “Step by Step.”

Family life

Away from the work, Lakin married Brandon Breault in 2014, and the couple have two daughters. She’s spoken warmly about balancing a demanding creative career with raising kids — a normal, grounded life that sits comfortably alongside her showbiz one.

06Summary

Christine Lakin’s story is a quietly impressive one: the tomboy from a ’90s sitcom who grew up to run the set. She never chased a comeback because she never really left — she just kept working, kept learning, and kept climbing toward the job she wanted most.

The kid who spent Friday nights making us laugh grew into a filmmaker calling the shots — and in 2026, Christine Lakin’s best work may still be ahead of her.