Get Used to It: Ep. 141, "Voices of Our Lives: Lily Tomlin"

(typewriter tapping) (upbeat guitar music) - Hi, welcome to "Get Used To It." I'm Sheila Kuehl, and I generally try to lead you through the maze of whatever we're doing on this show. As you know, "Get Used To It" generally every month does a show of things that might be of interest about and to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community and their allies, which I hope is everyone in the world. Today, we have something really special for you. Occasionally, we do a one-on-one interview of a person that we really want you to know better. We call it "Voices of our Lives," a very clever title. And today I am incredibly pleased to have on my show actress, raconteur, greatest American humorist since Mark Twain, and my personal goddess, Lily Tomlin. - [Lily] Hi, Sheila. - Hi Lily, welcome to the show. - Thank you. - So what we generally do in "Voices of our Lives" is try to get an idea of kinda where people came from. So if you don't mind, just sort of the standard beginning, where were you born? - [Lily] Detroit. - Detroit. - [Lily] Inner city. - And your family was? - They're from Kentucky, came up to work in the factories. - In like making cars? - Yeah. My mom didn't work 'cause my dad didn't want her to work. Women didn't work in those days, unless they were, I don't know, unless they had to. They had to work. - Well, my mom was the same and she worked in a factory when she was like 11. - Well, my mom did work down in the south. She worked in a button factory. But when she came, and after she married my dad, he didn't want her to work. It's an emblem of pride for working class guy in those days, his wife didn't work. Eventually, she worked when I was about 12 as a nurse's aide. - Uh-huh. So your interest in healthcare began very early. - Yes, it did it. Oh, it truly did. - Well, everybody's did. It's like the first time they got sick, I think, they thought, opp, there's something going on here. - No, I remember my tonsillectomy when I was five. I remember it vividly. - [Sheila] Yeah? - Yeah. - [Sheila] Why? - Well, because it was an unusual experience. In those days, they put a little piece of rubber over your eyes and they gave you ether. - [Sheila] Oh yeah. - And I was sure. Anyway, I was hypochondrial as a kid. I used to read home medical counselors, partly because I like the plastic overlays with all the body parts, you know? - [Sheila] Uh-huh. - And then I also like to read about diseases. I just was sort of fascinated by diseases. The idea that you could be gestating some organism for years before you knew you had the disease. - It's a strange fascination, Lily, but we're not surprised. - It sounds like it is, but I don't think it was. I just thought it was interesting. - [Sheila] Were you born Lily Tomlin? - Born Mary Jean. My mother's name was Lily. My dad's name was Guy. So I always thought they had the best show business names, Lily and Guy. And I wanted to get my brother to change his name to Guy. I changed mine to Lily. I mean, I didn't change it legally. And one day down in the Village, they were looking for English performers for a cabaret thing. And so I said, we'll go down and we'll pretend, we'll say we're Lily and Guy Tomlin and talk with an English accent. And as a result, I didn't get in that show, but I did get in a mime show. Anyway. - Well, I wanna get to the Village because, of course, how you get from Detroit to the Village is an interesting thing too. - If I start talking, it'll be forever. - We like forever. - I have a baby brother. He's almost four years younger. - [Sheila] What's his real name? Not Guy. - Richard. Richard. - Does he live on the West coast? - He lives in Nashville. - Oh, Nashville. - He'd prefer to live on the West coast (women laugh), but he is living in Nashville and he has lived there for several years. His partner lives there, and is from Kentucky also, which same origins of my parents. In fact, my mother knew Michael, his partner, when he was a little bag boy at the supermarket. - [Sheila] Wow. - When he was about 12. He's younger than my brother, about 20 years. - [Sheila] So when did your family move to Detroit 'cause you were born there. - Born in Detroit. My mother and dad came up sometime after they'd married and I guess I was born there a year or two later. - So did you stay there long enough to start school there? - Oh no, in Detroit? I lived my whole life in Detroit. - Oh, I see. - I went summers to Kentucky and stayed on the farm and then I'd come back and I'd live in inner city Detroit. I lived in a predominantly Black neighborhood. And so I had a lot of experience with humanity. I lived in an old apartment house with every kind of person you can imagine. - Was it, did you like your childhood or was it scary? - I think I loved it. No, see, that's the thing. People try to force me into disavowing my childhood (laughs) and I have a hard time to do it. I mean, my dad was out, was an alcoholic and died when he was so only 56, but it was never a big deal to me. I'm sure other kids are raised in that environment. They think it's horrific. I hear kids say very somber and tragically that one or both of their parents were alcoholic. My dad was a fairly benign alcoholic, I guess that's maybe the difference. But he was sober all week. My father was a very hard worker. But he did go on benders on the weekends and I would go to the track with him. I'd go the bookie joints with him. And I liked as much of life as I could get ahold of. - Now, where do you think that comes from? - [Lily] I have no, I don't- - It's interesting, you say you're reading medical books and meeting lots of different people. - And marriage manuals, very big on marriage manuals. We didn't have a marriage manual in our house. But the neighbors did. - Was a marriage manual, a sex manual, or? - It tells you how to copulate in different positions. - Well, I could understand being interested in that. I mean, come on. - Yeah. A marriage manual is mostly about sex. behaving sexually and behaving in the right, some accommodating way I guess. And satisfying way. - [Sheila] Yes, right. Or to do it right. - Yeah. So did you go to public schools in Detroit? - Oh, public schools, sure. Neighborhood schools. I went one block one way was my grade school. And one block the other way was my junior high. And this old building we lived, my brother and I, my mother had- My mother was sort of a vacuum cleaner fanatic. She liked vacuum cleaners. And, of course, she was preyed on by all the vacuum cleaner salesmen that would come to the door. - [Sheila] Of course. - And I would forever be finding some old Kirby. They sold Kirbys door-to-door. And I knew that it would be trouble for my mom 'cause she couldn't pay for them. There were just too many. But they would talk her into buying them. And they'd tell you, "If you get 10 of your friends to buy one, yours will be free." Like you have 10 friends who can afford to buy this Kirby, which cost about $300 in those days. - [Sheila] Oh my gosh. - They were really expensive. And so I'd find another poor old vacuum cleaner. And I'd try to salvage the situation. I'd say, "Let me see the contract, Mom." I knew if it wasn't 72 hours, there was some law that you could rescind the contract. And I would always try to do that in time, but what did I start to tell you, dammit? Oh my brother. So we had always had vacuum cleaners and vacuum cleaner hoses that go from tank-type vacuums. - [Sheila] Right, sure. - So my brother and I would come, when we were still going to the same grade school before I left shortly after he started, 'cause I was older, but we'd come home from school and there'd always be some tough kid harassing us or something like that. And we'd run upstairs. We lived in the second floor apartment by this time. We went from the basement to the first floor, to the second floor, which was bigger. And so we would drop the hose out the window of this upstairs apartment. It was tweedy, so it would sort of match the bricks, and we'd wait for the tough kids to be coming by. And then we'd shout down, "We're gonna kick your ass!" And the kids would like turn and look around. And, of course, that was, I give you that taste of that just to give you an idea of my little brother. - Well, I get it. - That was his idea. - I was thinking you were dropping things through it or turning the vacuum on backwards and all the dirt goes out. - [Lily] That's too reasonable. - Yeah, I guess so. So were you a performer from the beginning? - Yeah, pretty much, I think. I put on shows. - [Sheila] Full of personality at the age of four. - Yeah, maybe so. - [Sheila] Yeah? - I think I liked everything so much. I think I was really kind of in love with being in that apartment house and being in my neighborhood and then going to Kentucky in the summers and seeing all the cultural differences. And, of course, I was very big on my cousin's two farm kids are just out there someplace on a biological level and they, when animals, or goats were copulating or cows or anybody in the field because of big farms, we'd set up a cry and you'd run to a certain field or wherever the action was going on. And I would go back to, this was in kindergarten, I would go back and draw what I'd seen. And so it's that theatrical sense of knowing that you're shocking or you're titillating 'cause the adults react so strongly. They're amused, they sort of are taken aback, but in an amused way and they treat you as if you're innocent and you don't quite know what you've done. - What about the other kids? Do they flock to that or kind of you're weird? - Well, I didn't care. I had no desire to be friends with my peer group. I much preferred my teacher. Ms. Margaret Ann Sweeney was my favorite teacher at that time. She was my second grade teacher. And then later, she was my fifth grade teacher. And she was the youngest teacher in school. In fact, I did a long monologue, one of my absolute favorite monologues about Ms. Sweeney, about me being madly in love with her and offending her later on in the school term and her chastising me and my world just crumbled. And I fantasize throwing myself in front of a bus, 'cause I had all these movie fantasies going, and at the last minute she comes in and I die before she can get there because she's rushing to say goodbye to her favorite pupil. And I go too soon and I say, my last words are, "Tell Ms. Sweeney, goodbye." And I go. - So what was high school like then? - I was very popular. I was voted most popular girl. - Wow. - I was a cheerleader. - I don't know, I can't see you as a cheerleader. - I was a cheer. - Okay, I believe you. - But we weren't this kind of a cheerleader. We were like really soulful. We were get down cheerleaders. - [Sheila] Oh yeah, it was Detroit. - Yeah. - [Sheila] Yeah, exactly. - And yeah, so. - But sometimes in high school is when it begins to occur to us like. - [Lily] That you're gay or? - Gay or who we are or, and even in terms of what we're gonna do. Like what we're gonna do next. - Well, what's your family? Was your family blue collar? - [Sheila] Yeah. - I don't think you. What? Your family was. See, I didn't have too much struggle. I used to make the joke that in our neighborhood your parents were happy if the boy didn't go to jail and the girl didn't get pregnant. - Right. Well, we had no expectations either. - [Lily] Yeah. - Exactly. So college was not like they were all going, "Go to college, go to college," right? - No, but you had to do something. - [Sheila] Right, exactly. So how'd you decide what to do? - Well, a lot of stuff happened to me just kind of circumstantially. When I was in college, I was in pre-med, which was kind of a joke. - [Sheila] Really? - Well, I had a certain inclination towards certain sciences, but nothing. I couldn't do anything very abstract. I mean, I would be terrible in chemistry or some really advanced mathematics. I was good at biological sciences and anatomy and things like that. You know, I'd done quite a bit of study on anatomy. And so that didn't work. I left because I got in a college show and I was such a hit that I said, "I'm gonna go to New York." 'Cause I was not a good student. - So you were in college and said, "I give up, I'm not staying in college. I'm going to New York?" - Well, and people responded so much. I did a monologue in a college show and it was so much more contentful and interesting than anything else the kids. They were doing all very collegiate kind of stuff, like a takeoff on "Gunsmoke" or that kind of thing. - So was this intentional in terms of a monologue because so much of the work that we've seen you do later, it's very beautifully crafted. I mean, it's seems to just be coming out of you like you're thinking it up when you say it, of course. - [Lily] Oh my gosh. - But it's really crafted, right? - Generally speaking yes, generally. Yeah, the monologues absolutely. But you have thank Jane for a lot of that. - Well, but Jane didn't write your monologue in college. - No, but I had an instinct for content or social class because I had grown up. And my first of all, my mother's maiden name was Ford just by coincidence. And, of course, the Fords lived in Grosse Pointe near Detroit and they had a daughter Charlotte, who was my age. We never owned a car. Luckily probably, 'cause my dad would probably have gotten in an accident. He'd say, "I'll pay that old boy to drive me to the track." You know the color of all that, of being with Southern people. And I mean, to me, it's totally a culture and you love the way it goes and the way it talks and the way it does everything, prepares food. So my dad would always be paying somebody. He was a factory worker. If he made $100 a week, I'd be surprised. And he'd pay some old boy. I never even knew the guy's name. They'd always be called some old boy. (women laugh) "I'm gonna pay that old boy from work to drive me to the track." And, of course, I'd go with him. And I used to book his bets. I'd wait during the evening because my dad would always play to win and bless his heart. - [Sheila] You mean not to place, not to show, but only to win. - Yeah, only to win. And he'd always play the favorite and he'd throw $100 on a horse because he'd always had a role. He'd either be flat broke or he'd have $2,000 and he'd be into the bookie too probably. 'Cause I do recall as a child late night phone calls that were sort of scary to my dad and they were probably his bookie. Anyway. - So you were doing a monologue. That's where this I was- - Yes, I was doing. So that monologue. Well that was just, I could ad lib on a certain comedic level, but I cannot ad lib on a certain literary level that Jane is capable of writing. - Sure. - You know? Much finer, much- - But it's interesting 'cause you got such a response. - [Lily] I did. - That it changed your whole life. - Yeah, it did. I mean, they were so enthusiastic and I did an upper class woman, a Grosse Pointe matron, who's talking about, I didn't finish about my mother being named Ford, so I borrowed it. And during Charlotte Ford's debut preparations, which were reputedly to cost 250,000, and this is like 50 years ago, that would be like, what $5 million, some extraordinary amount of money. And my mother said, "Oh, I just wish I could." This is when newspapers had society columns. She said, "Oh, I just wish I could see those preparations at the Grosse Pointe of the state." So finally I borrowed an old car, a '49 Ford, and the honest to God, the driver's side tied the door shut with a rope. They had to tie it shut. And I said, "Mom, if we get stuck out in Grosse Pointe, it's gonna be really embarrassing." But so we go out and sure enough, there's cars just driving around the estate, trying to see the twinkle lights and the canopies. And so my mom got a look and she was satisfied. And then jumped forward a few years, and I went to school with the young woman who became Henry Ford's widow. - [Sheila] Wow. - And so last time I was out there with her, we called my mom and she said, "Mrs. Tomlin, you can come in the front door now." So it's all colorful. - It is colorful, but it's interesting. It's interesting to me, the things that we're going this way. And then something happens, and now we're going this way. And it's either fate or intentional, or I don't know, some combination. You had to go through something thinking, oh, I'm going to New York now. - Oh, when you're young. I think, when you're young you think. And plus, Holly Golightly had come out that year in '62. And I had a lot of Holly Golightly damage. I thought you go to New York, you live in a Brownstone, I didn't know that's what they were called really, and you have a tree in front of your house and you go to the restroom, you get $50, you know? (women laugh) I, literally, at this juncture, when I decided, after midterms, I decided to go to New York, I borrowed $5 from nine friends. - [Sheila] Wow. - And you could get a non-scheduled prop flight in those days from Detroit to New York for $15. - [Sheila] Wow. - On Continental. So I did that. - When the stewardesses still wore gloves. - [Lily] Probably. - Yeah. - And not to wear red lipstick. Remember, it was supposed to remind people of blood. They had to wear like light pink or something. Anyway, and I bought a white trench coat, kind of cream colored trenchcoat like Holly had in "Tiffany's." And, remember, I wish I brought a picture, 'cause you'd see that Audrey heparin damage. I had big sunglasses like this. And you know how she had her hair up on top of her head kind of like Nefertiti in a way. She'd have all this hair wound up. And then she'd have a babushka tied over and tied around in the back with these big sunglasses. And I had the perfect outfit. I went to New York in the spring or summer near summer, like April or May, whenever midterms are over. And I went up to live there. I'd known this girl just slightly in college at Wayne State where I was going. And when I got there, she was living in a railroad flat on 2nd Avenue between 4th and 5th, or 3rd and 4th, I forget. And she was living there with this painter. and Franz Kline had died that summer of '72. And he had painted these huge black and white canvases. He thought he was carrying on Franz's Kline's work. And they hated each other. And all they'd written, cursed each other out in above this wainscotting here. And so I came in all perky with this trenchcoat on and these sunglasses and with about, I think, I had $20 or $25 left outta my 45. Maybe not that much even. 'Cause I spent it all on dinner the next night, and then I didn't have a red cent. And I found out later, years later, I found out she was very depressed when I got there and she smoked Luckies and everything, and she dropped outta school. She was going to Columbia and she'd been pregnant, had a child and had given it up for adoption. - [Sheila] Oh wow, well, you didn't know. - I didn't know. And so me though, I'm already just to take on the world and I start pulling up linoleum and I was gonna paint the kitchen and somehow get rid of the roaches. But the best part was the painter lived, he slept all day and worked all night in the living room. And if you know a railroad flat, there's only a window at the front, and then a little air shaft window at the back. And she wouldn't let me sleep on his roll-a-way 'cause that would be like fraternizing. She wouldn't let me sleep with her because it was a three quarter bed. And she didn't want me to sleep with her. She never said why, but other than the size of the bed. - [Sheila] We never knew why. - We never knew exactly why. I was trying to- - Work? - What was it? So I had to sleep on a footlocker. For about a week, I slept on a footlocker with a round top. Oh it was (Sheila laughs) so difficult. - So you have no money. You're sleeping on a footlocker. These people around curse words on the wall against each other. - And he's got Farina boiled over on the stove and she won't allow me to speak to him. And oh, those are great days in the East Village anyway. I mean really fabulous. 'Cause it was still, there was just a little hippie enclave and they were beatnik and hippies were coming in infiltrating and all the ethnicities were still there, all the Italians and the Slovaks. - Oh kind of what year are we talking about. - [Lily] '62. - Uh-huh. Wow. So then what do you do? I mean I'm here, I'm in New Yorker. - [Lily] I've got a job right away. I get the newspaper and Saturday night, I wanted to get a job as a waitress at the Figueroa. That was my aim and to study mime 'cause I was naturally good as a mime. And when I get there that night. I get there on a Friday or something. And Saturday we walk over, Jenny and I, to the West Village and we have dinner and it cost every cent I had. - [Sheila] Oh wow. - At the Figueroa. And I put my name in. Of course, there was a list this long of girls, just like me who wanted a job at the Figueroa 'cause that was so hip in those days. - [Sheila] Of course. - And so I thought, well, we're really in trouble, Jenny. She didn't have a job and this and that. I shouldn't have mentioned her name, darn it. - That's all right. No one will know. - All right. So, I get the newspaper out. I wash my hair, it's Saturday night, right? So I get "The Sunday Times." I go through the want ads and all the typists are paying like $45 a week. I mean really pretty grim salaries. But I noticed that assistant bookkeepers are making like 85, $90 a week. And I had some assistant bookkeeping experience. So I set out for those bookkeeping jobs, and I got on the- Is this interesting? - [Sheila] It's fascinating. - I get on the 5th Avenue bus 'cause it used to go uptown 'cause I knew the streets were sequential and I just made a list, going all the way uptown from like 8th Street to 10th Street to whatever. And I got to the mid-50s at lunchtime and I got a job. This was a Monday. I got a job, I worked on Tuesday and I worked on Wednesday and I got paid that day, Wednesday, for two days' work. And I was making $90 a week. - But I bet you didn't stop. - And it was a talent agency. That was the big thing. - You were a bookkeeper for talent? - Assistant bookkeeper. - Assistant bookkeeper. - And the women at the office abused me because here I am. I've got this straight kind of hippy hair and I wearing a t-shirt, striped t-shirt, bateau neck, remember? And a burlap skirt. - Perfect for a mime actually. - Exactly. Well, that was my mindset. And they've got big bubble hairdo and Kimberly knits and great big fingernails. And they so abused me. Like they would say. First of all, they were from the Bronx. I could not understand a word they said. And I'm sitting out being the receptionist and the assistant bookkeeper, and they had all. The fellow who ran this place, he later owned ICM. Marvin Josephson. He was a very big agent and businessman. But at that time it was a small office, but he handled all these top newscasters. And I used to write all the alimony checks, you know? And then I wanted to get home so bad on Fridays 'cause I was so suffered while I was there. 'Cause you imagine typing on onion skin and then trying to file it and they're asking you to file it and the files are so jammed. - Well, and remember when you'd make a mistake making a copy? And you'd to erase every. - Put a separate paper behind. - I know. People have no idea now. - No idea, but worse to give the fluky in the office a stack of onion skin like this and say, "File this." You can't even get a knife blade into the file, much less another piece of onion skin. So I used to keep 'em. I read a thing in a magazine about make yourself indispensable. Keep those important papers in your desk, and when they can't find them, you produce it. So I did a little bit of that, but the epiphanous moment came when Josephson's secretary, who was really very disparaging toward me, both in look and word, and she was sitting there in the bookkeeper's office, adding up Marvin's expenses one day. And I'm like, Agnes Gooch. I've got these big ledgers and I'm like, "Come in," and her legs are crossed in the doorway. And, of course, I'm just galvanized 'cause I'm terrified of her. And I stop, I can't even speak. And finally the bookkeeper says, she says, "Let Mary pass." And Florence says, "Let her speak." She's doing with a pencil, doing the adding machine. She says, "Let her speak for herself." And that was it. I said, "Well, that's it, that's the final strive. I've been beaten to nothing." And I rose up like a phoenix. - And you said, "You're not gonna do this to me anymore, I'm outta here."? - Right, well, no, I stayed. Well, I did say I was gonna quit and Gloria said, "Can you please stay till labor day 'cause I'm going on my honeymoon?" And I said, "Okay." - So are we in mime school at the same time? Or did you kind of put off those dreams? - Well, mime school didn't last too long. I only went to mime school three weeks because it was so arduous. (Lily laughs) And everybody was so good. I mean, there wasn't a person who wasn't brilliant. But they were totally anonymous. And that really wasn't for me. I was looking for some kind of acknowledgement. - [Sheila] And so? - And I liked words much too much. - Yes, I was just thinking mime school, no. Although you certainly have the face and the body for it. - And I can indicate objects in the air and stuff like that. I'm necessarily really good at this. But I can approximate certain. - I've seen you write a number of Post-It notes that actually don't seem to be there. So it wasn't all a waste, the mime school. - No, no, no it wasn't. But I got in a mine show, in fact. - [Sheila] You did? - When I went down there to audition with my brother for the English cabaret, one of the fellas in the audience, or watching the auditions, was a mime and he had a mime show off and that's how I got my Equity card. And because I told him my name was Lily Tomlin to be English, that's on my equity card. That's how my name was stuck as Lily. Although I wanted that name anyway. - So did you have an idea about how you wanted to be a performer in New York? I mean it's. - Well, see that's part of. Well, you and I were talking earlier just about sexuality and it was sort of like either I was so innocent and have somehow held onto some little nucleus of innocence. It never dawned on me that I couldn't just be anything I wanted. I didn't know there was an ingenue, a leading lady and a character woman. I learned that later. - [Sheila] So you mean the sort of boxes that people wear? - Yeah, any kind of box. Sexual box, any kind, political box. - So did you have a sense about your sexuality though? Or was it kind of just? - Well, you know, I was very precocious sexually. - I don't wanna hear about the farm animals, (Lily laughs) but anything else. - Yeah, I mean, I was forever, either because why was I? Perhaps psychologists say, "Well, early on she had some." I had some disturbance that I didn't know. Why are children? Why are young children precocious sexually? Why are they interested in sexual things? - Well, there must be at least five different reasons. - I was interested in other things too. - So sexually active. - I mean, because I do this in my act sometimes. I talk about when I was about five, that's when we had moved up to the first floor from the basement, and there was a clothes pole. We had clothes poles in our yard where people hung their wash. And I could go out the dining room window and shinny down the clothes pole, see, and I discovered if you humped the pole, it was just fabulous. And I thought it was a game. - I think there's a lot of firemen that actually have found that out. - Is that right? A fire hall was right across the alley from us. And I used to see the firemen up on the roof with a couple of older girls from our building. - That is interesting, whether that's an aspect of being sort of free. - Physical, yeah. - In a lot of different ways. - Right. - Because I can imagine the Village during those times was also seen to be very open. - Yeah. - Very free. Everybody's sort of doing anything they wanted and everybody they wanted, I guess. So, I mean, that's what people imagine anyway. It sounds like a good time. Was it a good time? - I think it was sort of. I was pretty, uh. I'm not promiscuous or anything like that. It's not my nature to just pick up with anybody. - Well, I'm glad to hear that. I once gave a magazine interview where I said, "Well, I never slept with anyone I didn't know." - [Lily] That's good. - And I thought you have to take that right back because people will not understand that. But the performance part of it, I'm also interested in, in terms of how do you then move into where sort of the next phase of your life. - Where did we leave off, I forgot. - Well, we were in mine school for three weeks and we just quit our bookkeeping job. - I got the mime show and got my Equity card and all that stuff. - Right, Equity card. - I don't know. I just always, I was forever trying to build a monologue. Everybody else had a persona, who was doing standup, but it was too phony. It was like- There was only a handful of women doing standup really. Because women didn't. In fact, I have a favorite story I tell about that when I was at the Upstairs at the Downstairs, in the review, which Madeline Kahn got me the job 'cause she saw me at the Improv doing something and I went and auditioned. So there was a girl in our show, one of the shows I did there, who was an ingenue and she couldn't be more boring on stage. I mean, it was just like awful. But in the dressing room, she was hilarious. She'd tell me stories and she'd act them out or characterize them, and I'd be screaming. And I'd say, "You've got to do this on stage." And she'd pull herself up and her hair would get really huge, you know? And she had a fur coat and everything and she'd say, "Oh, I wouldn't want anyone to think I was unattractive." And that was really the truth. You either were supposed to be fat or scatterbrained or you didn't have big breasts. Something you played on. If you were doing a standup, generally speaking. Usually kind of demeaned yourself in some way. And most of the guys were sort of demeaning women, too. - There was a whole club of that. - Yeah. - So were there venues? I mean, people just went and you did your thing. - Well, I'd go the Improv a lot. I mean, I'd go the Improv. And then I had to have people vouch for me. I had to have some of the boy comics vouch for me that I was gonna be funny. And the first time I went to the Improv, Bud Friedman even tells about this, who was the owner. I used to have a lot of old antique clothes from the thrift shops and everything. And so I finally got a spot and I said, "I have to go on at 9:30." And I just was insistent about it. And so I wore a big. I used to have this blue velvet halter cut dress on the bias and I always had ankle strap. In fact, those first ankle straps Earnestine wore where a pair I had in my closet. And I had a big white, real ratty white fox fur. In the night they looked okay, but in the daytime you could see they were from a thrift shop and they were really bad, moth-eaten. So I go, I get all dressed to go to my gig at the Improv that night and I take the subway uptown to mid-town to the theater district. And I knew the limos are always sitting out there waiting for clients. And so in those days you give 'em 10 bucks and they take you somewhere as long as they could get back by 10 or 10:30. So I get a guy to drive me over to the Improv and the Improv had a big plate glass window at that time. So anybody that came up, you could see them come into the room. And I pulled up and I swept out in this blue velvet thing and all that big white fox fur, and I went in and I went on and I swept right out and got in the limo and left, you know? So it was. - So nobody knew why you had to be on at 9:30, but you did. - No, I did, sure. But I'm saying, that was part of the fun of it. And I've always dressed up. I always loved stunts. If we had Broadway shows, I would dress up. The first time I dressed up, the first show Jane and I had in '77, the box office opened like in February or something. It was very cold. And in those days, so many years ago, fans were very young and they would be in sleeping bags waiting, trying to get front row seats and all that stuff. And so I go out there as Mrs. Beasley, as a Red Cross volunteer. And I had a big veil from the '40s and a cape thrown back like this and we had an ambulance on site in case there were any injuries. And I spent the whole day serving coffee and donuts, and Kleenex 'cause everybody's nose is running, and it's just the fun of it. And people who are fans are terribly into it. They say, "Oh Mrs. Beasley, I'm so glad you and Harold were able to revive your marriage." Repair your marriage. - Well, the characters that you built, I mean, they're so real to people. I don't have to tell you. - [Lily] Yeah, they're real to me too. - It's just exactly what you're talking about. But the first time I saw you, and I don't know where this connects in time with now you're doing standup at the Improv, but I saw you on Steve Allen's show. - Yeah, well, that's the first time I ever was on, it was the second time I was on television. - And that, I don't even remember what years were we on then? - It had to be like '68. - Yeah. - 60-somewhere, 'cause I had. - Because he had the most popular variety show or whatever they call it of anybody. And he said, "Well, here's a new talent and we just want you to see her." And it seems to me, you did a monologue under a hair dryer. - I probably did Madame Lupe, the world's oldest living beauty expert. - Yes, exactly, exactly. And I mean, it was totally accidental, but obviously memorable. - But it was good monologue 'cause she rejuvenates her face and then she sneezes and it all falls down again because I was conscious of the double standard for women's looks and youth and beauty. And of course in all the big beauty leaders at that time, Estee Lauder and Elizabeth Arden and Helena Rubinstein, they were like in their 80s (women laugh), but you never saw them in their true form. You only saw old pictures. In Helena's case, you only saw her hands going (claps) with those big rings. So I was mad for that stuff. Mad for anything social like that. - Well, it was just- - But I wanted to be fun. I wanted to be informed and funny. - But you were funny in a very different way. I mean, I remember feeling kind of ambivalent because it was so funny and I laughed every second, which I always do when you talk, but somewhere inside something is going, this is also very poignant, I think, without thinking about it, you know what I mean? - Yeah. - Some combination, your whole show is like that really. And other things you've done. And it's a very special persona, I think. - Well, I don't know what to say about it. I did and then later I took a big leap up when I was with Jane, when I am with Jane. I am with Jane. I want people out there to know that. - [Sheila] Yeah, it's 20-something. - I get enough of those calls. - [Sheila] It's a lot of years, right? - What? - [Sheila] A lot of years? - Oh yeah, 37 years Jane and I have been together, March 31st. - [Sheila] Can I ask you how you met? - Yeah. We actually had a mutual friend and she introduced us in New York. And Jane showed very little interest in me. So then I happened to see "J.T.," which she had written in '69. And let's see, so this was '70. I must have met her in '70. And then she came out to work on my Edith Ann album in '71. She had had a show in '69, but I saw it in rerun. After I had met her, I was just mad for her. So I was trying to learn everything I could about her and I knew she'd won a Peabody for this teleplay called "J.T." And I got a copy of it, or I saw it in a rerun 'cause it reran for like 25 years at holiday time. And I was so taken with it because it's everything that the way she writes. It's tender, it's satirical. It's intelligent, it's edgy. It kind of has a huge human view. And the characters are- And every line is like a perception and yet it seems naturalistic and it moves a plot forward and the characters forward and an imaginative, like in "J.T.", he befriends a stray cat, who's got a bad eye and he builds a little house for him out of an old abandoned oven, like an oven. And he puts an umbrella over the top of it. And this is way back in '69. So he was being bullied by some neighborhood toughs, but he was only about maybe 10. Anyway, it won a Peabody and it was very critically received. And I thought, oh, if only I could make Edith like this, Edith Ann. - Now, where did. Wait! Let me just put a comma. Edith Ann was your invention, but for what? - [Lily] "Laugh-In." - For "Laugh-In." - [Lily] Yes. - That's what I thought. So now you're in regular television. - Yes. And famous. - [Sheila] And you're famous. That's an interesting change, isn't it? I mean, you weren't famous. You were doing stand up. You got more famous. - Yeah. Well, I got on "Laugh-In." That's what made me famous. - Did you audition for "Laugh-In", did somebody come and get you? - Well, they saw, I started doing the, "The Merv Griffin Show" in New York in '68, and I did several monologues and I would buy the monologue. I'd take the money from the show and I'd buy the monologue. So I'd have the film. And he would let unknown people. He had all unknown kids on in those days. Pryor would be on too, but lots of people who weren't well known. And I'd go on maybe once a month, and I did several of my old monologues on there. And George Slaughter, who produced "Laugh-In," saw one of the monologues. And he gave me the offer to go on "Laugh-In." But I also had an offer to go on another show called "Music Scene," which was like a precursor to "Midnight Special." And I thought that was much hipper. I thought "Laugh-In" was square and I didn't wanna be on TV anyway. I wanted to be a stage actress. - [Sheila] Sure. (Lily laughs) - And then, of course, later I did a television special "Lily Sold Out" because I was only too eager do so when the right opportunity came. - So Jane wasn't writing for you then? - [Lily] Not at that moment, no. - So did Edith Ann come really out of you or did the character (Lily drowns out Sheila). - Yeah, I wanted to do a child on "Laugh-In." I came on "Laugh-In" mid-season. "Music Scene" failed. And we did concerts with Janis and Jimi Hendrix and everybody. It was totally hip. This was '69, and parents hated it. In prime time, they saw. - [Sheila] Too dangerous. - They were too doper, long hair and all that stuff. So the offer came again to go to "Laugh-In." And so I went and met with George and he so understood me, or seemed to, that I went on the show. Other people I'd show them different characters and they'd kind of move their chair back 10 feet. (Sheila laughs) Or they'd press that buzzer on the floor and say, "I have to take this." And I've left those. - I think, I just wanna wash my hair, sorry. - I can remember sobbing in a phone booth leaving an audition for the "Dick Cavett Show" in the early days. And I was doing Lupe, Madame Lupe or someone like that. They had brought in the office people to watch to see if I was funny, and the office people started leaving. One at a time they just drift out. And pretty soon it's just me and the guy there. And he gets a phone call. Oh, I was just so humiliated. And I went out in the lobby of this building and went in the phone booth and just sobbed, crying. And another time I auditioned for Chuck Grodin, who later he played my husband in "The Incredible Shrinking Woman." And I adore him. But he didn't, I was unknown. And I went and auditioned for "Lovers and Other Strangers," Renee's and Joe's thing. And who knows what the hell I was doing. I was not an experienced actress. I mean, I made up my own stuff. But it's very different from taking somebody else's idea and trying to figure out what. And this was the one where the girl is listening for about five minutes to her boyfriend or fiance. They're supposed to get married the next day or something, and he's telling her all the reasons that he doesn't wanna get married. And at the end, all she's doing is listening. And at the end, she just says, "Did you pick up your tux?" So you can imagine for five minutes, what I must have been doing to try to draw attention to myself. (women laugh) - And Chuck comes up to me, he pulls his chair up and he says, "Honey, have you ever acted before?" Oh, and that's another sobbing in the phone booth episode. - [Sheila] Oh, there must be a few of those. - Oh yeah. - But on "Laugh-In" all of a sudden the thing took off. - It was the right show for me because it did those kinds of vignettes and comedic far circle characters. And so I took Ernestine there and she was an immediate sensation. And then when I came back in the fall, I introduced Edith Ann. You started asking me how I did Edith, and I just started doing a kid. I wanted to do a kid. So I would go to the ice house in Pasadena and I would improv Edith and I'd tell the audience to ask me questions. And I slowly built her voice, her persona. - But you were saying that you wanted Jane to help build that character. - Yeah, I wanted to do more. - So was this just kind of a come-on to get Jane more into your life or? - Oh yeah, well, mostly, yes. I mean, I was looking for some connection that, because as I say, she didn't show an inordinate interest in me. And I had even. - This is okay because it's not breaking my heart because I know it all turned out well. - Oh, it turned out great. But listen, I probably, I went to the mat sort of in a way, like when our friend introduced us, I was staying at a hotel in New York, and she brought Jane up for just to meet me in the hotel and then I had to go somewhere. Ernestine's album was coming out right about that time. And so we went over to, Ruben's used to be over there, by the Sherry Netherland and it's not there anymore. We went over to that deli, see, and I'm just thinking I have to leave, I have to go on tour. What am I gonna do? How am I gonna get this woman's attention? And so when I got up to leave, I just kissed her full on the mouth with a certain urgency. And then I started calling her. I said, "I have to leave town the day after tomorrow or something." I said, "I have to see you." - It's like going off to war. Who knows if I'm coming back. - Yeah, that's how it felt. Anyway, I prevail. And we just sort of spent the day together and went around and stuff like that. I probably was so ridiculous trying to impress her, trying to make sure, do you know I'm on television? I mean, I don't think I was saying it that way, but I'd be bringing up these obscure things, trying to make her draw me out on the subject. Anyway, so later, so she did come and help me work on the Edith Ann album. - And you became a couple? - Very, very soon. We have the same sensibility and plus she's from Tennessee. So she knows that whole Southern culture. - So was that ever an issue for you, Lily? I mean, I know that a lot of people are like, this is my private life and really nobody's business. - Well, in those early days, we'd have people, when we were doing specials for the networks and stuff. I've even had a good girl, one of the writers on the show said to me, "I think you and Jane should come to work in different cars." - [Sheila] Oh, wow. And I said, "Why would we do that?" She says, she was just kind of like this and that and blah, blah, blah. Anyway, that didn't matter. That would be about like '73. - But did it kind of give you, I mean, it. - Well, it was difficult in the sense that we were certainly not closeted in our personal lives, and people didn't write about. The culture was not tabloid eyes then. And plus we did good work and I think people. It was like they were gonna leave us alone in a certain way 'cause we didn't really seek out anything sensational. We didn't do anything sensational. We were pretty normal people. And so even as time rolled on. I just said this recently, I did a press interview the other day for Canada. And I said, "I was a little jealous of Ellen because she got to come out in such a big way, you know?" And I was here so long, so long and I would do different things, but it was like, even if I, and I always referenced Jane, but nobody ever wrote about it and they kind of had me on the fence. Well, how much are you gonna take me or not? And the time was just different. I can remember being on Carson's show in '73. And he said to me, knowing full well, he said, "Don't you want any children?" And you could hear the audience stop dead. 'Cause just to even to say you didn't want children as a female was a heavy, a heavy statement. And I said, I got outta it. I mean I lightened it by just saying. I said, "I really like children." I said, "But frankly I don't really want to have any children and I don't feel like raising any children, rearing any children." I said, "By the way, who has custody of yours?" (Sheila laughs) - [Sheila] Oops. - Just to be funny, but. - Well, but people are not, it's an interesting thing. - I don't think I would've. I mean, I probably, I would've been a good mother in the sense that I, because it would be if I had a child, I would've devoted myself to the child. I mean, I would've really, but I probably wouldn't have been happy to give up a lot. - No, there's always that sort of conflict. But then I think life takes us where we're meant to be. That's sort of my basic thought because I don't wanna spend a lot of time thinking about what the life not lived. - Yeah, exactly. - Or what could have been. Especially if it's a good life that we're in. Because, I mean, you became a big star. Not that that's a great life for everybody, but it seemed to be a good life for you because you were popular for good work. I mean it wasn't just personality. - And when you do comedy, if people do like you, they have a real affection for you 'cause they've had a lot of enjoyment from you and you really share something because I was talking with Rob here backstage, and he brought up just a little phrase of Ernestine from her album. And just the recollection of it makes you laugh. And it's not a funny line per se, but in Ernestine's mouth and in the context, and I have a fan who emails me all the time and I tell you, he can write a whole letter that's relevant using old lines and phrases from bits. He is. He's like a walking library of stuff. - Well, people do love it so much. I mean, it's an interesting thing about celebrity or fandom or I don't even know what you'd call it. That sometimes it's really deep. You know, it means a lot to people, the work that you do and the people that you are. And I think, and I say, the people that you are, because you are a lot of people for people. - Yeah, right. If they don't like one, maybe they'll like the other one. - Exactly, well, you give us a great variety. I mean, in your show, for instance, now how long after "Laugh-In" was? - "Laugh-In" went off in '73. So then we did "Appearing Nightly" first in '77. And that sort of legitimized me 'cause I open on Broadway and that show was a success. But in those days I was really rigid in what I thought were my integrity. And so I said to Jane, "We need to go to New York and play a theater so I don't have to do one nighters all the time." And so we did. We took material we had and everything and we had new stuff, and we put a show together and she said, "Well, you've gotta have a title." 'Cause it was really just like me doing a certain number of vignettes and all, but she said. See, she's so smart. She just knows. The simplest little thing. She's, "You've got to have a title. That's the only way people understand that it's more theatrical." And I already made my poster. I was ready to go as soon as a theater came available because they don't like to give limited runs a theater. So I only announced for four weeks. And then when we were such a hit, I mean, we were just a huge hit, and we were sold out right away. And so the promoter comes to me and says, "We've gotta extend, we've gotta extend." I said, "No, no. I told them four weeks, and that's it. If I extend they'll know that I was planning on trying to sell those tickets and then sell more." And I said, "It's just too humiliating." - [Sheila] Such integrity. - I just won't do it. So finally he says, "You've gotta do it. The people are begging for tickets and all that stuff." I said, "Okay, I'll extend for four more weeks and that's it." And I said, "And we have to have a tour ready so that they know I'm serious." And I'm sure I could have played for a year on Broadway in that first show. - I'm sure. - But anyway, so that was '77. And in '85, we did "The Search." So it was eight years. - That's an amazing piece of work. - It is. Yeah, and it's Jane's. - I mean, I think I've seen it four times in different cities. I mean, when you first opened, I flew to New York and. - Did you? - Yeah, and it wasn't cheap. And I thought, well, but I've gotta do that. And I didn't know you. - Oh it's costly, and I really do owe you. - Yeah, right. No, I owe you. But it's such an undertaking to kind of, I don't know. Do you intentionally kind of wrap your head around what's happening currently and comment on it? It's kind of a stupid question, I don't even know how to ask it. - No, no, it's not. Of course, it isn't, - But it just seems like you put your finger on so much stuff, like your line about cynicism. - Oh, that's a great line. - Yeah. I mean, everybody. - The line is: no matter how cynical you become, it's never enough to keep up. That's Jane's. Of course, that's Jane's line and Ted Koppel must have used it 10 times on "Nightline," over the years. - [Sheila] Somebody quoted you the other day and didn't who had said it. - As Lily says. - I don't mean on television. I mean to me, you know, at work. - He always said, "As Lily says." - He would, yeah. And I'd have to write him and say, "You know this is Jane's line from "The Search For Sign," blah, blah, blah. Next time, a couple years later, or 18 months later, he'd use it again. And he'd say, "As Lily Tomlin says." - And you did films too. I mean, for a person who wanted to be legitimate on the Broadway stage. - Yeah, that harks back to that leading lady character woman, et cetera. It never dawned me I couldn't be in the movies, especially being on a show like "Laugh-In" and doing characters, like Ernestine and stuff. That's why Altman is probably the one. He gave me the job because he probably never saw Ernestine. - Well, there was no Ernestine in Nashville. That's true. - No, no, that's right. - No, that was extraordinary. - Yeah, I got nominated for that, but so how luckier could you get to the first time on film to get in one of Altman's movies? And I've generally been better in Altman's movies than other movies or because he allowed us to be freer. He's much more improv oriented. In fact, oh, you know, Jerry Trudeau spoke at Robert's memorial in New York. And he said, "I'm asking, I'm writing pages and pages of script every day and then I see it evaporate into improvisation." And I say to Altman, I'd say, "Why am I writing all these pages of script?" And Altman says, "You write the script so the actors know who they are." And then we can take off from it, and he's absolutely right. - But you don't get directors like that to work with. - No, I mean, not very often, no. - You can make 100 movies and you'd only get two like that, unless you're part of a somebody stable, which some actors get to be. So what was the most rewarding of anything you've done? - Search. I think 'cause it was Jane. We made a real point of trying to have Jane acknowledged because when she's working with someone like me, who's so far out front and who's been doing this kind of thing and I have a certain kind of ease doing it. Like you saying, it sounds like it's coming out of you at the moment, which it couldn't be further from the truth. And so we said, how are we gonna make Jane be acknowledged as she should be? And she still hasn't been. But so we created the logo for the play with her name. So it could never be published without her name there. But I always, I dominated the equation when you'd be out in the public like that. - Well, but something both of you had to expect, right? I mean. - Well, I worried about it. Probably was more than she expected. More than she might have wanted 'cause she's very, she's extremely happy right now because we're part of this new website called wowowow.com. And it's for women of a certain age, as they say. Although I think we're getting a broader audience than that. - We're truly certain about our age. Oh, oh. - That's right. And it's founded by Liz Smith and Leslie Stahl and Peggy Noonan and Mary Wells of Wells, Rich and Greene, who was a huge advertising success. - What's the website? - It's about women politics, talking, sharing things. Just today, Jane posted some eco cartoons 'cause she can do anything and you never know what she's up to. She's up there and, of course, I'm like her worker bee. I'm forever like cleaning up the paste and keeping track of the little pieces of stuff she cuts and pastes together. And I used to make the joke about- Here's what I wanted to do, but I'm so physically different than she is. I wanted to do a one woman show where I play her, but it's so different than she is. And then I would be off stage talking to her sometimes. - Maybe it doesn't matter that you're different. - I know, but the charm of her is this. It's hard to, you can't depict it. And she's much more charming than I am. I mean, she has a real kind of Southern, I don't know. Like she'll go to dinner maybe once out of 40 times with friends and I'm the one that has to always show up and keep the date. - [Sheila] Yes, of course. - 'Cause we call her maybe Jane, everybody calls her, maybe Jane. Well, who's going? Well, so and so and so, and maybe Jane. So that's her nickname, maybe Jane always. And here's what she'll do 'cause she's reads, she knows everything that's going on. She'll say, "Oh God, we've gotta get tickets for when Gordon Liddy and Timothy Leary were going around together and they were going to play Royce Hall. She said, "Oh we've gotta go see them. We've gotta go see." This is 20 years ago. And so I say, "Okay." They're sold out, and I'm trying to get tickets. And I worked like hell to get tickets. I get four tickets finally. And I invite two other people to go with us to see this and the night of, I'm at the bottom of the stairs, and I say, "You gotta get ready. We're going to Royce Hall tonight to see Gordon Liddy." "Oh," she says, "I don't want to go tonight." It's just that simple. So, the other three of us go. - Sounds like it works though. - Oh yeah, no, no. And oh, what I really meant to say was. So here I show up all the time, so they couldn't be less interested when I show up again. But when Jane shows up, oh this is an event. - I think it's very sweet. - No, it's wonderful. I mean, it's wonderful, but she has that quality that they're yearning to see her anyway. - I understand. - Yeah. - Well, we've got three minutes left in the show and I would be remiss if I didn't say. - Yes. - Is there anything that you thought you were gonna say to me, I mean, I don't think you planned anything, but at the end you would say to me, "Oh, I wanted to talk about X." So I don't know, is there anything? - Well, Jane and I are kind of, we're sort of in name producers of this off Broadway show, "Beebo Brinkers Chronicles," based on the Anne Bannon books. It's only playing now till April 27th, I think, at the 37 Arts. - And then you think it'll go around. - We're hoping to expand it into television or movie. - Wonderful. - Because Anne Bannon wrote five books, back in the '50s, and early '60s, and we think they have a tremendous potential for showing just what the politics were like in those days and the culture and everything else, you know? And they're quite funny. They can be quite funny too. - [Sheila] I think it's great. - They're kind of steamy off Broadway because these girls sort of. - [Sheila] Well, you can be sort of. - Yeah, you know. - Listen, I have had a wonderful time. I hope it's been okay. It was good for me, I hope it was good for you. - [Lily] very good. - I'm really grateful that you were here. - [Lily] Yeah, okay. - Yeah, I'd love a cigarette afterwards. Now, there's no smoking in here. We don't smoke. And I'm really glad that you could join us because there are so many people in our community, around our community, people you've heard of, people you haven't heard of, and sometimes, occasionally, fabulously great goddess like Lily Tomlin. (Lily laughs) And so if you've got that goddess in you, you've gotta do this. If you've got that comic in you, you've gotta do it. If you're a bookkeeper, be a bookkeeper, whatever it is, it's really important because this is a woman who's really been true to herself. And I think that is the most fabulous thing. - You honor me. - So, whatever it is, "Get Used To It". (upbeat guitar music)