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WANT TO PUT Lily Tomlin in a great mood? Just mention you saw her perform at the old Latin Casino in Cherry Hill in the mid-'70s. In no time you'll be strolling happily down Memory Lane with the actress-comedian who on Saturday makes her long-overdue Atlantic City debut at Borgata Hotel, Casino & Spa.
That's exactly what happened when I brought up her long-ago weeklong gig at the top of a recent long-distance phone chat.
What was meant to be a quick icebreaker triggered an extended monologue filled with memories she admitted she hadn't conjured in quite a while. Among her too-numerous-to-recite-here recollections was the night she decided to make her entrance pretending to be part of the supper club's waitstaff.
"I had the spotlights circling, and I went outside and changed into a waitress uniform and came back in and started busing dishes," she recalled with a chuckle. Then there was the night she and her crew hit a nearby White Tower for an after-show bite with a side order of outlandish prank.
"We took niacin and we could see our skin flushing against the white tile," she said.
But Tomlin who, believe it or not, is 70 years old, wasn't on the phone just for nostalgia's sake. The raison d'être for the interview was the Borgata date, which begged the question: How could she could possibly do what is arguably her most famous character, Ernestine, the insufferably rude telephone operator?
After all, a routine about an operator sitting at a console plugging and unplugging cables is about as relevant today as a sketch about installing a TV antenna on the roof of a house.
As it turns out, Tomlin's current incarnation of Ernestine is as au courant as tomorrow's headlines.
"Since the divestiture [of the phone company monopoly] she wouldn't go along with it," said Tomlin of Ernestine. "She was never polite with a customer and didn't intend to start. For a while, she had a Web-based job. Now, she's working for a large health insurer. It's a perfect fit for her."
That her fictional alter ego, whom she introduced on "Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In" four decades ago, finds herself in the midst of the biggest political battle the country has seen in years speaks to Tomlin's knack for finding personas that resonate with the public. But Ernestine was in the middle of the fight before President Obama took it nationwide.
"I've been involved with health care for a while," she explained, "and I'd been doing [the bit] for months. I worked closely on a bill that [California Gov. Arnold] Schwarzenegger vetoed twice. We think if we could get [health-care reform] in California, and people can see that it works, we can get it nationally.
"So the news sort of caught up to Ernestine."
Ernestine, of course, is just one of the characters Tomlin will bring to Borgata. As she did in her Tony Award-winning Broadway show, "The Search for Intelligent Life in the Universe," she'll share the stage with a small army of male and female characters who aren't always out for the big laugh but who speak with the human condition in all of its maddening permutations.
She said she'll also talk with the audience about such topics as her Detroit childhood and Atlantic City.
"I love to take the audience on a trip where they don't know what's coming next," she offered. "If you can take the audience with you, you can be anyone and go anywhere.
"My [goal] is always to validate us as a species. As people, we are connected and we are in the same situation all together. But," she added, taking a shot at a favorite target, "politicians are the only exemption."
That she has yet to appear in an AyCee showroom shouldn't suggest Tomlin spends most of her life at the Southern California home she shares with her longtime life- and writing-partner, Jane Wagner. She does "40-50" live shows annually. And these days, she's an in-demand character actor on some of TV's hippest and hottest series.
First, there was her recurring role last season as the duplicitous Roberta McCluskey on "Desperate Housewives." Soon, she'll be seen in at least six episodes of FX's critically acclaimed legal drama, "Damages," headlined by Glenn Close.
"I play [a member] of a rich New York family who comes up against Glenn's character," she said. "I'm the matriarch, Campbell Scott plays my son, and Martin Short plays our lawyer."
Tomlin noted this isn't just another payday for her. "It's my favorite show," she proclaimed. "It's an exciting show."
Although she's reached the three score and 10 milepost, Tomlin has no reason to consider calling it a day, professionally speaking, because she doesn't see any physical hurdles in her near future.
"I have to tell you," she said, "the Tomlin family . . . must have youthful genes. Most of my relatives lived into their 90s.
"I just hope I have the same kind of thing."
Borgata Hotel, Casino & Spa, One Borgata Way, Atlantic City, 9 p.m. Saturday, $65 and $50, 866-900-4849, www.theborgata.com.
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