100 WOMEN WE LOVE 2008
Lily Tomlin’s extraordinary career as a funny lady bloomed on the TV show Laugh-In in 1969, the year of the Stonewall rebellion. Fittingly, she has woven feminism and LGBT life into her characters—the not-so-hardworking phone operator Ernestine, Violet Newstead in 9 to 5 and the numerous personas populating The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, the one-woman play written by Tomlin’s partner Jane Wagner, for which Tomlin won a Tony Award. She was also nominated for an Academy Award for her turn as Linnea Reese in Robert Altman’s Nashville, played recurring roles on TV shows from Murphy Brown to The West Wing, and has won six Emmys, a Grammy, and a Lifetime Achievement Tony Award in 1977. Tomlin, who has called Wagner the most influential person in her life and career, narrated 1995’s landmark LGBT documentary The Celluloid Closet. –KL
In no particular order…
Hats off to the 100 Women We Love, class of 2008 (in no particular order, ’cause we love ’em all!).
Kate Bornstein
Author and performance artist Kate Bornstein was born a biological male in North Dakota, where she began questioning gender at a young age. “It started when I was four years old….I thought okay, I’m a girl. I kept that inside me for thirty or forty years, and finally decided I wanted to be a woman.” But besides wanting to be one, Kate found herself attracted to women as well, so she visited a therapist who explained to her the difference between sexual orientation and gender identity. “She looked at me and said, ‘dammit, you’re a lesbian…’” Kate recalls. “But I call myself a tranny dyke.” Kate has published several books about gender, including Gender Outlaw: Men, Women and the Rest of Us and Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks and Other Outlaws. She tours colleges and high schools, giving talks and leading workshops about sex and gender identity. –CL
In no particular order…
