 Hey Ben, it’s Lily,” rasps Lily Tomlin as she catches me off guard with an informal phone call from Vegas. Taking a break from her recent tour—she’s performed at least 40-50 shows every year since being on Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In in 1969—the award-winning actress and comedian took the time to chat with us about her only New York appearance, a one-night-only benefit for Dixon Place, the recently relocated Lower East Side experimental theater. As a major supporter of new queer artists through its its nontraditional artistic development and annual Hot! Festival, Dixon Place is just the kind of artistic refuge Tomlin feels a kinship with, having worked for many years in a similar informal manner. “I had a little theater in L.A. [and] I would advertise works in progress,” Tomlin, 70, says. “No costumes, no props, no refunds! I’d just leaflet colleges and bookstores with ‘Lily Doin’ New Material’ and then they’d have to call up and take a fan quiz [to] find out the address. I’d ask them really esoteric things that only hardcore fans would know!”
Like Dixon, Tomlin’s non-traditional—and many would say unabashedly queer—sensibility is what has kept her exciting, and kept her working. There is no shortage of projects on Tomlin’s schedule. In addition to her tour, she is also costarring as a ruthless family matriarch opposite Glenn Close on the new season of Damages, developing a spin-off of her guest role alongside Kathryn Joosten on Desperate Housewives and working with lesbian comedian Reno on a film adaptation of Tomlin’s famous character, the 5-and-a-half-year-old know-it-all, Edith Ann.
It’s also Tomlin’s working relationship with Reno that brought her to Dixon Place. “I was playing Newark not too long ago and Reno came and we talked about doing something,” Tomlin explains, adding that in the show, “Reno’s going to do something and I’m going to do something. We’ll do something together.”
While she’s a Los Angeles resident with longtime partner, Jane Wagner, Tomlin has always had a special place in her heart for New York, having lived on Fifth Street in the East Village for many years. “There used to be a Laundromat on Second Avenue and I used to corner people to do a monologue,” she relates about her formative days. “ It could’ve be a monologue they’ve seen three times [but] that’s all I can think about: ‘Just do it at any chance you get.’”
It was also in New York that Tomlin joined Dolly Parton for last year’s opening of the musical adaptation of their landmark film, Nine to Five. “Of course I liked it,” Tomlin boasts when asked her the show. “The first time I saw it, it was almost surreal.”
When I finally ask Tomlin—a woman who broke down many gender stereotypes by experimenting with male drag in her early days and cementing feminist roles into popular culture in her heyday—if she thinks of herself as a gay icon, she is modest as usual. “I’m sure to some extent,” she admits, “I do certain characters, like Ernestine, who attract gay audiences. Even now, 40 years later, there are people who do Ernestine [drag]. And people show up to my concerts dressed as Ernestine.”
It is this informal enthusiasm that Tomlin has about her own work that she also likes about Dixon Place. “People just invite their friends to come see their little monologues,” she says of the theater. “I always did works in progress,” she adds about her art. “I don’t think [I] can even stop. I could do it for myself.” N
An Intimate Evening with Lily Tomlin unfolds on Monday, November 23 at Dixon Place (161A Chrystie St, 212-352-3101) at 8pm. Visit DixonPlace.org and LilyTomlin.com for more info. |
