Miss Tomlin is a SATIRIST, and a genius. She mocks her own generation in somewhat the same way that Jules Feiffer does. She puts them on the stage, and "puts them on," and so skillful is she, so brilliant, so witty, she makes them laugh at their own comic images….

"PERFORM" is one word for what she does; she surely is a performer. But she is also a creator, and that's rare and wonderful. She creates, or recreates, a gallery of people, children and adults, some of whom are reflections of herself and, at the same time, universal. Summoning them up from memory or imagination, she makes them vivid, human, funny and sometimes sad. There is no suggestion of mawkishness in "Lily Tomlin on the Way to Broadway," but there is a strong strain of sentiment.

Although she concentrates on teen-agers, and post-teens, she is perhaps most remarkable...