with Paul Weitz. Photo via Getty Images
The great Lily Tomlin hits the road literally and figuratively this weekend in Paul Weitz's terrific Grandma, previously reviewed right here by both myself at Sundance and Joe Reid at Tribeca. The movie just opened in the major markets and more cities will follow soon. For my column at Towleroad published earlier today I ranked the ten movie roles that I think of as her best from her now 40 year old movie career. I hope you'll read it.
Consider this weekend the ignition of her Oscar campaign engine, too. It's Lily's first leading role in a feature since (gulp) 1988's Big Business so this doesn't happen very often at all and we must take notice! Go see it I'm so proud that The Film Experience is on the poster for this one.
Lily was Emmy-nominated last month for Grace & Frankie and if Grandma can continue building on this moment of newfound appreciation of a 75 year-old living legend, an Oscar nomination for Best Actress could well follow. You know how that goes sometimes when the culture rallies around an actor in a particular moment like "Oh, right. We've always loved you -- here you go, diva!" (see Diane Keaton's easy nomination rode for Somethings Gotta Give or Julianne Moore's win last seaon)
Let's take a trip through Lily Tomlin's spotty film career via movie posters (with a couple of excerpts from my Towleroad piece)! How many of her 24 features have you seen?
She's never been prolific as a movie star but these first 10 years of her film career (1975-1984) were special: an Oscar nominated debut (Nashville), a Golden Globe & BAFTA nominated follow up (The Late Show), a storied flop (Moment to Moment), a mega-hit (Nine to Five) and two more star turns in comedies (The Incredible Shrinking Woman and All of Me). I haven't seen All of Me in far too long.
(1988-1991) Lily Tomlin stopped making movies for some reason in the mid 80s but returned with Big Business, her last leading role in a feature until now. Can you believe it? I'll admit I don't love it as much as many other Fans of the 1980s do. But it's silly fun. It only came in at number 8 in my list...
Will I be shunned for placing this so low? This identical twins switched at birth comedy duet with Bette Midler is beloved but Bette gets all the best stuff — don’t deny it! Still, Lily has fun with her dual roles as a fussy clumsy businesswoman and her aggressive confrontational country sister.
She also released a filmed version of her beloved one woman stage show The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, and followed that with a bit part in Woody Allen's Shadows and Fog as a prostitute in a brothel that also included Kathy Bates and Jodie Foster.
And from that moment forward it was only supporting roles...
The next decade (1993-2001) was all over the place with two very obvious highlights in Short Cuts (1993) and Flirting With Disaster (1996), which is still one of David O. Russell's best.
The first of her two collaborations with Oscar favorite David O. Russell (of The Fighter, Silver Linings Playbook, and American Hustle fame) is a very funny comedy about an uptight man (Ben Stiller) in search of his birth parents (Alan Alda & Lily Tomlin). When he finds them, he discovers that they’re drug-selling paranoid hippies. Chaos ensues. Lily & Alan are a lot of fun but Josh Brolin and Richard Jenkins steal the show as gay lovers and FBI agents.
Which brings us to the last decade of her work (2004-2015) which is culminating in quite a career capper by way of Grandma which was written for her by Paul Weitz because of the time they spent together on Admission. So something good did come out of the poorly reviewed Admission after all!
Go see Grandma this weekend... and tell us how many of her films you've seen in the comments. Which are your favorites?