Lily Tomlin's humor is a victory of the comic spirit in a world closer to [Jonathan] Swift's than to [George] Meredith's, as her … one-woman show, "Appearing Nitely,"… makes clear. Before Tomlin appears onstage, a small female voice, tremulous but clear, seeps out through the house. "I am not afraid of anything," it sings in a nursery-rhyme sing-song, the suggestion being that it has considered the alternative. The world Tomlin sees has much in it to fear: the social condition is chaotic … and all of us are subject to dehumanization….

Tomlin's characters, both the new and the familiar, live in an isolated world, hardly ever rooted in a family or close friendships. The few who are in families invariably have reason for disappointment. (p. 14)

It is possible that Tomlin herself does not find the isolation, the outsider status, so appalling. She has, quite merrily, described herself as being "out...