Happy Birthday, Lily Tomlin

The out actress and comedian has maintained and expanded her successful career over multiple decades.

She won her early popularity as Ernestine, the “ringy-dingy” telephone operator in the ’60s and was also notably among the first female comedians to don male drag (and cross racial boundaries) with her portrayal of black soul singer Pervis Hawkins, according to The Advocate. Tomlin would go on to win critical acclaim and an Academy Award nomination for Nashville. Her other film credits include costarring with Bette Midler in Big Business, Jane Fonda and Dolly Parton in Nine to Five, and Meryl Streep in A Prairie Home Companion. She also provided the narration for the documentary The Celluloid Closet.    

Tomlin picked up a Tony award for her one-woman show The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, written by longtime partner Jane Wagner, and has had recurring roles in several television series, including Desperate Housewives, Murphy Brown, The West Wing, and Will & Grace.

She also famously kept her cool in the presence of a livid director, David O. Russell, on the set of I Heart Huckabees.

Happy 70th birthday! Tomlin just gets better and better with age.