Las Vegas Weekly

November 11, 2009 · 1:42 PM

Photo Gallery: Lily Tomlin’s show ‘clever, thought-provoking humor’

By Robin Leach

Lily Tomlin performs at the MGM Grand's Hollywood Theater.

Photo: Tom Donoghue/www.donoghuephotography.com

Not Playing With a Full Deck, comedienne Lily Tomlin’s debut Las Vegas show after 40 years in showbiz, starts and ends in very unique ways. She is shot from a cannon for her white-top-hat entrance from the rear of MGM’s Hollywood Theater and uses her Twitter to say she’s landed safely in Sin City. The 70-year-old legendary performer ends the night walking the stage and, totally unscripted, answers questions from the audience. I have never seen that in Las Vegas before!

Lily, along with a cast of comedy characters including beloved 7-year-old monster child Edith Ann and sexually frustrated ex-telephone operator Ernestine, paces the stage with a nonstop, hour-plus-long monologue. It’s clever, thought-provoking humor, with ad lib, funny lines thrown in for good measure. When she started coughing with “dry throat,” she knocked over a water bottle and laughed: “Celine had her own humidifiers to deal with that. I get a bottle of water!”

Contributing photographer Tom Donoghue and I were invited by Lily to attend her performance in Las Vegas. Click HERE for my original interview with Lily when she packed up in Los Angeles to head here for her nine-day run.

Her spoof of a 1960s infomercial for a sex product was hysterical. Her analysis of “beauty without” by her Madame Lupe character, the world’s oldest beauty expert, was side-splittingly funny. But of course the anticipation was for the re-creation of Edith Ann from Laugh-In. Lily told me she kept the original giant white chair that producer George Schlatter had the NBC props department build.

“It’s still with me. They made good, strong furniture back then,” she laughed. “I just add a fresh coat of white paint every now and again.”

And once again, it was former crabby Ma Bell phone operator Ernestine that brought the house down. Today, though, she works in the claims denial department of a major health care provider and invoked disgraced financier Bernie Madoff’s name in denying a heart attack victim’s compensation. “He didn’t have a heart, so why should you?” she sniggled.

It was amazing how she transformed herself into all the characters with just facial expressions and voices, especially when she became a greedy televangelist and had the MGM audience do a chorus of “I Got Boogie” after every wild money pitch. Her interpretation of an actress going to New York to find fame and fortune as a Howard Johnson’s waitress was an upside-down piece of comedic genius.

Photo: Tom Donoghue/www.donoghuephotography.com

Lily Tomlin performs at the MGM Grand's Hollywood Theater.

Lily, currently appearing on six episodes of Glenn Close’s award-winning FX series Damages, told us that she plays the head of a powerful, rich family, with Martin Short in the role of her lawyer.

“One day to break up the drama, Martin and I played Mr. Grimble and Edith Ann as a total surprise to answer all of Glenn’s serious, scripted legal grilling. That sure cracked up the whole filming,” laughed Lily.

Not Playing With a Full Deck is at MGM Grand through Nov. 18. Audiences in her Joker section and Golden Circle get to meet her onstage afterward and pose for photos with her in the famous rocking chair. They also get a souvenir deck of cards with photos of all of Lily’s characters over the years.

She told me after her premiere: “I don’t know why I waited so long to come to Vegas. I was a little frightened nobody would show up, but we had a full house and the audience was marvelous. There was a lot of love going both ways between the stage and the audience. I am thrilled they loved it so much. There’s nothing dirty or vulgar in this show. It’s intelligent comedy, too, and I’m glad they all got it.”

Photo: Tom Donoghue/www.donoghuephotography.com

Lily Tomlin and Robin Leach onstage at the MGM Grand with the original Edith Ann rocking chair from Laugh-In on Nov. 10, 2009.

Now that she’s conquered her fear of Las Vegas, she’d like to return. “I did this taped TV special back in 1981 at Caesars Palace with all these cheesy characters like Johnny Velour. Now I’d love to do that as a live Vegas production if we can figure it out.”

Meantime, while she’s here this visit, she plans on hitting as many of our famous star chef restaurants as she can. Make sure you run to the box office and catch her show before she leaves town. It’s a definite must-see.

Robin Leach has been a journalist for more than 50 years and has spent the past decade giving readers the inside scoop on Las Vegas, the world’s premier platinum playground.

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