`GRANDMA' LILY,

Tomlin tackles role written specifically for her

NEW YORK — In “Grandma” (opening Friday), Lily Tomlin is winning acclaim as an independent woman who tries to help her desperate teenage granddaughter.

Not surprisingly, this tour de force was written specifically for her.

“I worked with Paul Weitz on `Admission,' ” Tomlin told the Herald, referring to the “Grandma” writer/director's 2013 comedy.

“I really liked Paul and I liked `Admission,' where I played Tina Fey's mother. Shortly after that, he called to have coffee and presented this script to me out of nowhere.”

“Grandma” follows Tomlin's Elle Reid, a lesbian still mourning her late partner. Her granddaughter Sage (Julia Garner) asks her for $600 so she can have an abortion that very afternoon.

Did Tomlin have input into the character or situation?

“Very minimally,” she said during an interview at the Warwick Hotel.

“Just housekeeping things, like, `Why doesn't she have any money? What's the best reason for her to be really strapped?'

“Paul came up with Elle having to pay her partner's medical bills and cutting up her credit cards just to come up from under the burden of debt.

“The only thing I did suggest was the little girl standing outside the abortion clinic should punch me in the face. Because we'd had an experience like that,” Tomlin said, then laughed.

She and Jane Wagner, her longtime (since 1971) partner and frequent collaborator, were in Las Vegas for a TV special. At 2 a.m., Wagner saw a 4-year-old girl alone in the casino.

“Jane goes over, gets down on her knee and says, `Honey, where's your mom?' And the little girl just whacks her, just like that. I told that to Paul, that that would be better than me getting hit by (an anti-abortion) sign or something like that.”

As to how close Tomlin is to Elle, she said, “I drove my own car in the movie. I wore my own clothes. So she is sort of like me, yeah. But so was the woman in `Admission,' who was also a feminist.”

Today as an “out” actor, does she feel an extra responsibility?

“No more than I have a responsibility to a housewife in Omaha, to treat her with care and dignity,” Tomlin answered. “You just want whatever you do to be beneficial to humanity and not be a detriment.”